MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russia plans to produce 30 million doses of an experimental COVID-19 vaccine in the country this year, in order to manufacture another 170 million abroad, Reuters told Reuters the head of the country’s sovereign fund.
The first human trial of the vaccine, a one-month check on 38 people, ended this week. The researchers concluded that it was safe and induced an immune reaction, the strength of this reaction is not yet clear.
A larger Phase III trial involving several thousand more people is expected to begin in August, said Kirill Dmitriev, director of the Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF).
“We, based on existing results, will be approved in Russia in August and in some other countries in September. Array …, which is probably the first approved vaccine in the world,” he said in an interview.
More than one hundred vaccines imaginable are being developed to verify and prevent the pandemic. According to World Health Organization data, at least two are in phase III human trials: one is evolving through Sinopharm in China and the other through AstraZeneca and the University of Oxford.
Producers are also grappling with how to massively build production to meet global needs.
Dmitriev said the Phase III trial in Russia will be conducted at home and in two Middle Eastern countries, and will begin after the end of a Phase II trial of 100 people on August 3.
Russia in talks with Saudi Arabia about being a verification site and a production partner, he said at a separate press conference.
The Gamaleya Institute in Moscow, which developed the Russian candidate vaccine, produces doses for clinical trials, while Alium personal pharmaceutical corporations, a component of the Sistema-R-Pharm conglomerate, are responsible for bottling.
Both are updating their lab settings so they can resume in the coming months, Dmitriev said.
“There is a general sense that for so-called collective immunity in Russia, between 40 and 50 million other people will have to be vaccinated,” reuters told Reuters.
“So we think we’ll be fit and produce about 30 million (national doses) this year, and then we’ll be able to finish vaccination next year.”
Russia has also concluded production agreements with five other countries and can produce up to 170 million doses this year, Dmitriev said.
He refused to say where or give the main points of prices, however, he said that the countries of Latin America, the Middle East and had expressed interest in loading the vaccine.
Russia has also reached an agreement with drug manufacturer AstraZeneca on its future COVID-19 vaccine, called AZD1222. “We hope that one of the corporations in our portfolio will also paint the vaccine matrix.. AstraZeneca in Russia,” Dmitriev said.
Written through Polina Ivanova, edited through Kate Kelland and John Stonestreet
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