Russia’s President Vladimir Putin has asserted the Sputnik V vaccine, which will soon be deployed in India to fight Covid-19, is as reliable as the legendary AK-47 assault rifle.
"They (Sputnik V jabs) are as reliable as an AK-47,” Putin said during a video conference on Thursday, citing the ever-reliable Soviet-origin weapon. He added: “By the way, it wasn’t us who said that, this was said by a European specialist. And I think that he is certainly right."
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Putin stressed that the Russian vaccines are reliable and safe. "Our medications are based on technologies and platforms that have been used literally for decades. They are also very modern and up-to-date, and undoubtedly, they are the most reliable and the safest," he said as quoted by Russia’s Tass news agency.
He pointed out that makers of western vaccines also laud the efficacy and innovativeness of their vaccines, but their overall performance would be determined only after 10 years of usage and analysis.
Tass cited Florian Thalhammer, chief infectious disease specialist at the Medical University of Vienna and Chairman of the Austrian Society for Infectious Diseases and Tropical Medicine (OEGIT) as saying that t Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine against the coronavirus infection was comparable efficacy and reliability the Kalashnikov assault rifle.
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"Sputnik V is like an AK-47, a Russian rifle, [it is] simple, reliable and effective. The encouraging data was published in a highly respected journal, late, but nonetheless. During the first and second jabs different viral vectors are used, which boosts the effectiveness," the professor said in an interview with the Kronen Zeitung newspaper.
Meanwhile, Russia is rushing another 150,000 doses of Sputnik V vaccines by Friday to help strategic partner India combat the second Covid-19 wave, and a bigger consignment of three million doses will be landing in Hyderabad by the end of this month with Dr Reddy’s Laboratories, according to a report in the Hindustan Times.
Moscow has decided to ramp up the supply of Sputnik V doses to India to more than five million next month and more than 10 million shots in July.
