5 things you need to know about the Russian COVID-19 vaccine

It looks like Russia is not leaving any stone unturned to ensure that it becomes the first country to give the world a much-awaited vaccine to the novel coronavirus. The recent development is that the results of the first clinical trials are out and according to the scientists, it looks like that there are no problems there.

“We were primarily testing for safety,” Elena Smolyarchuk, a department director at Sechenov University and one of the coordinators of the trial, said.

“On non-specific immunity, we can only talk about preliminary results. These show a good, positive tendency, a strengthening of non-specific immunity,” she said.

Although, no promises are made as of now as the final outcome is still awaited. But there is no doubt that if all goes well, we might be getting the ultimate cure we have been waiting for very soon. Hence, it becomes important to know about and be more aware of this vaccination.

So, here are 5 things you must know about this Russian COVID-19 antidote:

1. The vaccine is developed by Gamalei National Research Centre for Epidemiology and Microbiology in partnership with the Russian Defence Ministry.

2. According to the TASS news agency of Russia, the first phase of human trial for this vaccine was started on June 18th with 18 volunteers from the armed forces having been chosen for administering the vaccine.

3. The news agency also said that the second phase will begin on 13th July.

4. According to the Russian Defense Ministry, it expects clinical trials to be fully completed by the end of July.

5. Volunteers who participated in the 18th June trial were discharged on 15th July. According to scientists, they are all healthy and there is nothing to worry about. The next lot of volunteers will be discharged by 20th July.

There are speculations in the media that if everything goes as planned, then a vaccine can be expected by August 2020 but there is no official statement yet. 

Do you know that more than 100 possible vaccines are being developed and tested around the world to put an end to this pandemic? Out of these, 19 are in the human trials phase and only two are in the final Phase III – one by China’s Sinopharm and another by AstraZeneca and the University of Oxford. 

So, let’s hope one of them proves to be a success and saves us all from this pandemic!

(With inputs from Reuters)