MOSCOW, December 10. /TASS/. A mission of the Russian consumer and health watchdog has been sent to South Africa to conduct research into combating the coronavirus infection, the watchdog’s press service said on Friday.
"Following the Russian president’s instructions to assist the Republic of South Africa in combating novel coronavirus infections amid a surge of COVID-19 cases, the Federal Service for Surveillance on Consumer Rights Protection and Human Wellbeing (Rospotrebnadzor) has sent a team of specialists led by the service’s deputy head to South Africa," the statement said.
The team consists of scientists and practitioners from the service’s Central Research Institute of Epidemiology, the Microbe Research Anti-Plague Institute, and the Vector Research Center of Virology and Biotechnology.
"The mobile laboratories of Rospotrebnadzor’s specialized anti-epidemic teams mounted on Kamaz vehicles and a batch of Russian COVID-19 diagnostic test systems in the amount necessary to conduct 200,000 tests have been also shipped to South Africa," the statement says.
The cargoes and Russian experts are being airlifted to South Africa by the Russian Emergencies Ministry.
"A team of Russian specialists alongside South African specialists will conduct research and exchange experience in fighting the novel coronavirus infection," the ministry said.
On Thursday, the Kremlin reported that Russian President Vladimir Putin and his South African counterpart Cyril Ramaphosa agreed in a telephone conversation that Russian medical specialists and researchers as well as medical equipment would be dispatched to South Africa.