Putin offers himself up for vax experiment
Russia's President Vladimir Putin has revealed that he's received a booster shot of the Sputnik V vaccine, known as "Sputnik Light." He added that he's willing to take part in trials for a new method of delivering the formula.
Putin, who reported being fully vaccinated this spring, said, on Sunday, that that he was feeling no adverse effects after his third jab.
The revelation came as the president met the deputy director of Sputnik’s developer, Moscow's Gamaleya National Research Center of Epidemiology and Microbiology. Putin, who'd previously described the Russian-made coronavirus jabs as “as reliable as the AK-47,” told Denis Logunov he was following health officials’ recommendations in taking the booster shot.
He added that he’s ready to help test another form of Russian Covid-19 prevention, which has not yet been released – an intranasal vaccine currently undergoing a clinical trial on volunteers.
When asked whether he was ready to sign the necessary papers for taking part in the trials, Putin said he can “definitely” do so.
Nasal Covid-19 vaccines, administered through spray or drops, are at the cutting-edge of medications being developed in the global fight against the pandemic. This form of vaccination is said to offer several advantages over the classic jab: a recipient will not only be spared an injection, but will also gain extra protection to the lungs, the organ most severely harmed by the coronavirus. Moreover, the nasal vaccine could potentially be even self-administered.
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While the new form of inoculation is still undergoing trials at the Gamaleya Institute, the Sputnik V vaccine is already in use in more than 70 of the world’s countries, according to the Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF), which financed its development. According to data cited by Putin and Logunov on Sunday, over 50 million Russians, and some 120 million people across the world, have been vaccinated with Sputnik V.
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