Amid the rising novel coronavirus cases and deaths across the world, Russia has been pushing extensively for a Covid-19 vaccine for quite some time now.
Following that, the country will register its first vaccine against the coronavirus on 12 August, Deputy Health Minister Oleg Gridnev said on Friday, according to a report.
The vaccine has been developed jointly by the Gamaleya Research Institute and the Russian Defence Ministry.
"At the moment, the last, third, stage is underway. The trials are extremely important. We have to understand that the vaccine must be safe. Medical professionals and senior citizens will be the first to get vaccinated," Gridnev told reporters at the opening of a cancer centre building in the city of Ufa, according to Sputnik News.
According to the minister, the effectiveness of the vaccine will be judged when the population immunity has formed.
In an earlier report, the final check-up of volunteers testing the coronavirus vaccine, which is developed by Gamaleya National Research Center of Epidemiology and Microbiology, showed immunity in all participants, the Russian Defence Ministry said.
Clinical trials of the vaccine began on June 18 and included 38 volunteers. All of the participants developed immunity. The first group was discharged on July 15 and the second group on July 20.
Apart from this, volunteers who participated in a the second Covid-19 vaccine trial developed by Vektor State Research Center of Virology and Biotechnology are in good health and no side effects of the vaccination are observed, the press service of the Federal Service for Surveillance on Consumer Rights Protection and Human Wellbeing told TASS, a Russian news agency.
"All vaccinated volunteers are in good health. No complications after the inoculation with the EpiVacCorona vaccine against the coronavirus have been recorded," the statement said.
Meanwhile, the World Health Organization on Tuesday urged Russia to follow the established guidelines for producing safe and effective vaccines after Moscow announced plans to start swiftly producing COVID-19 vaccines.
WHO stressed that all vaccine candidates should go through the full stages of testing before being rolled out.
"There are established practices and there are guidelines out," WHO spokesman Christian Lindmeier told reporters at the United Nations in Geneva.
"Any vaccine...(or medicine) for this purpose should be, of course, going through all the various trials and tests before being licenced for roll-out," he said.
However, Russia has not yet published any scientific data from its first clinical trials. The WHO’s list of vaccine candidates in human testing still lists the Gamaleya product as in Phase 1 trials, reported Associated Press.
