‘I've had seven vaccinations against Covid-19 & I feel good‘ – Zhirinovsky
Vladimir Zhirinovsky, the leader of Russia’s ultra-nationalist LDPR party, has announced that he has received as many as seven vaccinations against Covid-19, offering himself up as an example of the safety and efficacy of jabs.
The 75-year-old political veteran, known for his populist views and confrontational political style, posted the news on his Telegram channel on Wednesday. He included a video of himself signing the paperwork and receiving the shot, and urged others to get vaccinated as soon as possible if they hadn’t already.
Polling has consistently shown that Zhirinovsky is the most popular non-governmental political figure in Russia.
“Coronavirus continues to make its way around the world,” he wrote. “Just in our country, nearly half a million people have died! Just imagine the scale. It’s as if a city like Tula, Kaliningrad, or Ryazan perished at once. But half the population of Russia hasn’t matured enough to get vaccinated. And this is simply pitiful. It means that the pandemic is going to continue, that people will keep getting infected and sick, and a city’s worth of dead will, unfortunately, keep growing.”
“Get vaccinated, friends,” he continued. “I’ve already gotten the Sputnik V vaccine, and this time CoviVac from the Chumakov Center. This is a classic vaccine with an inactivated virus, a technology that’s been used for decades. In total, it’s my seventh shot, beginning from September 2020. And I haven’t been sick with Coronavirus once, I feel good.”
Russia has faced a surge in the number of Covid-19 cases and deaths in recent weeks, with a series of days setting successive records in mortality.
With less than half of the population vaccinated, authorities have urged people to sign up to receive jabs, which have been widely available in the country since last year. However, Russian experts have argued that regular revaccination has not yet been proven necessary for protecting against serious Covid-19 cases.
Asked Tuesday about a suggestion from US pharma giant Pfizer to administer doses as often as every three months, Denis Logunov, a member of the team that developed Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine, said that for now, the data doesn’t indicate such a step is needed.
