"On the Russian vaccine again, this is an update from the last briefing. During that time, it was a very early stage of discussion between the WHO and the regulatory authority of Russia, and now we know that Russia has already shared their data for the phase I and phase II clinical trial with the WHO, and the Russian national regulatory authority itself has already given conditional approval for the vaccine. Beyond that, we do not have information yet as to the deployment of these vaccines in other countries", Dr Socorro Escalante said at a briefing.
In late September, Regional Director for Europe at the WHO Hans Kluge thanked Russia for "its excellent efforts to create a safe and effective vaccine". The official expressed confidence that the ongoing post-registration trials of the Russian vaccine will be successful and thanked all of the volunteers who agreed to take part in the testing.
Currently, Russia is carrying out post-registration clinical trials of Sputnik V, involving over 42,000 people in Russia and around the world.
Moscow has already received requests for one billion doses of the vaccine from at least 20 countries, but the authorities have noted that Russia has to attend to its own people first.
