ST. PETERSBURG, December 28. /TASS/. Russian President Vladimir Putin provided assurances that the Russian Sputnik V vaccine counteracts the new Omicron strain of coronavirus to a very high level.

"I spoke with Director of the Gamaleya National Research Center for Epidemiology and Microbiology (Alexander Gintsburg - TASS). They conducted research, and the Sputnik V vaccine neutralizes the new Omicron strain. He told me that the clinic [research] will provide a final answer to the question of how high the level of counteraction is," Putin said at the informal summit between the leaders of CIS states.

He added that Gintsburg talked to him "literally two days ago." "They conducted these studies but now the clinical research is ahead, to see to what extent [the Sputnik counteracts the virus]. But he said that what we did at the center gives us the confidence to be sure that [vaccine] neutralizes it to a great degree," the Russian president concluded.

Putin noted that Sputnik V [provides] about 90% protection. At the end of the report by the chief of the consumer rights watchdog Rospotrebnadzor, Anna Popova, on the situation with coronavirus, Putin invited his CIS colleagues "to discuss the topic raised by Anna Yurievna behind closed doors, and to talk about other issues that are of mutual interest.".