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Coronavirus pandemic

Russia calls on other countries to work jointly against coronavirus pandemic — Putin

Russia has numerously voiced its call to drop aside irrelevant ambitions. the Russian president added

SOCHI, October 21. /TASS/. Russia calls on other countries to drop aside irrelevant ambitions and work jointly in the fight against the coronavirus pandemic, Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Thursday.

"Traditional schemes were thought to be employed initially to tackle problems," Putin said at a meeting of the Valdai International Discussion Club. "They were different but still traditional. However, they are the ones, which are not operational."

"To be more precise, they are operational, but more often they are operational the other way around. As strange as it may seem - in favor of the worsening situation," Putin said.

"Russia has numerously voiced its call, which I repeat here, to drop aside irrelevant ambitions and start working jointly," the Russian president added.

Russia has so far registered five COVID-19 vaccines. They are Sputnik V and Sputnik Light developed by the Gamaleya National Research Center of Epidemiology and Microbiology, EpiVacCorona and EpiVacCorona-N created by the Vector State Research Center of Virology and Biotechnology and CoviVac from the Chumakov Federal Scientific Center for Research and Development of Immune and Biological Products.

Sputnik V, EpiVacCorona, EpiVacCorona-N and CoviVac are two-dose viccines, while Sputnik Light is a single-dose vaccine.

As of today, Russia is ranked 5th globally in terms of reported COVID-19 cases, which currently stand at over 8,131,160. A total of over 227,380 people have died of the novel coronavirus infection there, while more than 7,091,600 have recovered from the illness.

In late December 2019, Chinese officials informed the World Health Organization (WHO) about the outbreak of a previously unknown pneumonia in the city of Wuhan, in central China. Since then, cases of the novel coronavirus - named COVID-19 by the WHO - have been reported in every corner of the globe, including Russia.

On March 11, 2020, the WHO declared the coronavirus outbreak a pandemic. According to the latest statistics, over 243,085,550 people have been infected worldwide and more than 9,941,610 deaths have been reported. In addition, so far, over 220,290,860 individuals have recovered from the illness across the globe.

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