Sputnik V wins over experts outside Russia

Scientists gave Russia's Sputnik V vaccine the green light on Tuesday, saying it was almost 92 percent effective in fighting COVID-19 based on peer-reviewed, late-stage trial results published in international medical journal The Lancet.

Experts said the Phase III trial results meant the world had another effective weapon to fight the deadly pandemic and justified to some extent Moscow's decision to roll out the vaccine before final data had been released.

The results, collated by the Gamaleya Institute in Moscow that developed and tested the vaccine, were in line with efficacy data reported at earlier stages of the trial, which began in September.

"The outcome reported here is clear," British scientists Ian Jones and Polly Roy wrote in an accompanying commentary. "Another vaccine can now join the fight to reduce the incidence of COVID-19."

According to the British medical journal, the results were based on data from 19,866 volunteers, of whom a quarter received a placebo, the researchers, led by the Gamaleya Institute's Denis Logunov, said.

Alexander Gintsburg, the head of the institute, said the expected duration of immunity provided by the vaccine will be over two years.

"We have a strong hope, which is confirmed by the already obtained results of clinical trials, that the vaccine will be able to provide immunity not for several months, or even a year, but for at least two years or more, which is the subject of our further research, of course," he said.

Kirill Dmitriev, CEO of the Russian Direct Investment Fund that bankrolled the development of the shot, called the study in The Lancet "check and mate to the critics of the Russian vaccine".

"Russia was right from the very beginning," he said.

Outside Russia, Sputnik V has received authorization in over a dozen countries, according to the fund－including the former Soviet republics of Belarus, Armenia and Turkmenistan; Latin American nations including Argentina, Bolivia and Venezuela; African nations such as Algeria as well as Serbia, Iran, the State of Palestine and the United Arab Emirates.

EU shortage

German Chancellor Angela Merkel said on Tuesday that every COVID-19 vaccine is welcomed in the European Union as the bloc is facing vaccine delivery difficulties, and the Austrian Health Ministry said it is evaluating the use of the Russian vaccine.

French President Emmanuel Macron said on Tuesday that for all who want a vaccine, there will be offered one "by the end of the summer" and he defended the strategy "we have adopted with Germany, with the European Union, which is precisely to vaccinate in Europe".

Macron said that if and when the European Medicines Agency decides to approve the Russian vaccine, it will not be a "political decision. It's a decision that is scientific."