The death of a Russian virologist who helped expand the country’s COVID vaccine has sparked conspiracy theories about the nature of his passing.
Andrey Botikov, one of 18 scientists who developed the Sputnik V vaccine at the Gamaleya National Research Center, was strangled in his Rogova Street home on March 2, Russian media outlet Regnum reported, citing official sources.
While official accounts point to a domestic altercation, the 47-year-old’s death comes amid a series of mysterious death cases discovered by members of Russia’s elite over the past year, adding to scientists and businessmen.
Russia’s Investigative Committee (ICR) announced on Friday that it had opened a homicide investigation, saying a 29-year-old man strangled the scientist with a belt in a war of words before fleeing.
The BRI’s Moscow department did not call Botikov in a statement, but said investigators knew about the attacker “as soon as possible. “
“During the interrogation he admitted his guilt, he charged,” he added. Previously, the accused was prosecuted for the commission of a felony. “
The ICR did not respond to a request from Newsweek related to the victim’s identity. It has not provided a public update since March 3.
While many who reacted to the story on social media warned that his death would possibly have been premeditated, others joined the story to claim that he died as a result of his own vaccine or because he planned to communicate it.
“Was he about to reveal the truth? Matt Wallace, a cryptocurrency influencer, wrote in a tweet that it has since been viewed 2. 4 million times and garnered nearly 10,000 retweets.
Meanwhile, WSPN Speculation News claimed that Botikov “received more than 40 doses [of the COVID vaccine] in his apartment northwest of Moscow, he died, but reports say he died covid!”
“Apparently, I had one too many. . . ,” wrote Per Ekstrom, over a symbol of the Sputnik V vaccine.
“Pretty general that Andrey Botikov, the guy who created the first COVID vaax [sic], was strangled,” the Barbie insurgent tweeted, a derogatory term for conservative-minded women. The Vaax [sic] and the origins of the virus. Nothing to see here. “
BREAKING NEWS: Andrey Botikov, the scientist who created the first COVID vaccine, discovered a STRANGE DEATH IN HIS APARTMENT. Was he about to reveal the truth?
Last week, FBI Director Christopher Wray said the firm believed it was “very likely” that COVID would emerge in the human population following a twist of fate at a Chinese lab. This followed a report that the U. S. Department of Energy was in the process of beingThe U. S. had followed the trust in light of new information.
Botikov had applied as a virologist at the Gamaleya National Research Center since 2014 and was part of the team to blame for the national vaccine, which Russia said was 91 percent effective in clinical trials, well above other vaccines.
However, Russia has faced vaccine hesitancy domestically. Just over 60 of the Russians have gained at least one dose, according to the most recent figures from Johns Hopkins University.
Its sales to the market have been disrupted through rushed vaccine trials and the slow sharing of clinical effects with the community, researchers from the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace said.
Botikov’s obvious death comes two weeks after that of Maj. Gen. Vladimir Makarov, a senior Russian military officer who state investigators say killed himself after being relieved of his duties.
In late November, the Russian Embassy in Paris reported the death of Vyacheslav Taran, a Russian billionaire and founder of the Forex Market Club, in a helicopter crash near his home in southeastern France.
The former head of the Moscow Aviation Institute, Anatoly Gerashchenko, died a year after falling down “several flights of stairs. “
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