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Coronavirus pandemic

Defense Ministry says there are plans abroad to discredit Russian COVID-19 vaccine

Sputnik V registered by Russia on August 11 became the world’s first coronavirus vaccine

© Sergei Karpukhin/TASS

MOSCOW, December 11. /TASS/. An information campaign against the Russian coronavirus vaccine bankrolled from abroad is underway, Russian Defense Ministry Spokesman Major General Igor Konashenkov told reporters.

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Over 150,000 Russians receive Sputnik V COVID-19 vaccine

"We know in detail what funds and resources have been earmarked from abroad to discredit the domestic vaccine in the world and in Russia," he said.

According to the spokesman, "a series of pseudo-analytical investigations" and false "eyewitness" testimony about the alleged danger of the Russian vaccine or rejection of vaccination, including in the Russian Armed Forces, is being prepared in social networks and Russian-language Internet resources funded by foreign grants.

Konashenkov stressed that the Russian vaccine was highly effective, and fake news about it would not improve the "healing properties" of its foreign counterparts.

Sputnik V registered by Russia on August 11 became the world’s first coronavirus vaccine. The vaccine was developed by the Gamaleya National Research Center of Epidemiology and Microbiology. Its post-registration trials began in Moscow on September 7, with volunteers receiving the first vaccine on September 9. A total of 40,000 people are involved in the program, 10,000 of them received a placebo instead of the vaccine.

According to interim research results, the efficacy of the Sputnik V vaccine exceeds 95% on the 42nd day after the first dose, provided that a patient receives the second dose.

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