Does anyone have a good link for the current status of the Gamaleya (Sputnik V) vaccine? I’ve been hearing and reading a lot of FUD about it, but if you were to take the (self reported) stats in this BBC article at face value it looks like one of the best options.
But really, despite a lot of pejorative language in there -- “Once they have this relationship, they can extort whatever they want” -- it just sounds like the same strategy the UK has been attempting (both politically, and in terms of vaccine development and approval), except the Russian version sounds more successful so far.
Edit to add: apologies in advance for dragging politics into this! But it seems like politics and vaccines are unfortunately intertwined.
There are two vaccines on the final stages of development in Russia. One from Gamaleya center (Moscow), another from «VECTOR» facility (Novosibirsk).
From my (layman's) point of view, Gamalaeya's vaccine is somewhat hurried in development. Also, Gamaleya is known for its lobbying power. In the past, it approved and popularized a number of controversial drugs like Kagocel and a few of «-feron» drugs.
VECTOR's vaccine, on other hand, looks more trustworthy.
The Russian Gam-COVID-Vac/Sputnik V vaccine looks very good, but for the US or to much of the West, there's a price to be paid for being in an effective state of war with another country. Although Gamaleya is now working with AZ/Oxford to see if substituting one of their doses for one of Oxford's will produce much better results, which I never would have expected.
This is based on the theory that the immune system response to Oxford's virus vector is mostly negating the benefit of the second dose taken 21 days after the first. Gam-COVID-Vac gets around this by using different viruses for each dose, and has 90% efficacy results from their Phase III trial. Unfortunately, no one can yet manufacture it in anything like bulk quantities, but they have set up manufacturing partnerships with a whole bunch of countries from India to South Korea.
There are several "Russian" vaccines. The one you are likely referring to is often called Sputnik V. It is tested (phase III should have ended in May 2021). Preliminary results published in February 2021 indicate that it is effective and safe.
It is expected but it very sad that due to political reasons there is so much BS about it.
On August 11th, 2020 the Russian government announced the world's first release of a vaccine against COVID-19, referring to the vaccine as "Sputnik 5" (Gam-COVID-Vac) to reflect Russia's previous victories in the Space Race. ([1])
The Russian Sputnik V vaccine is as effective as the Western ones. Fr all its flaws the Soviet Union was a scientific, educational and health giant, and its successor Russian state still is. The Sinopec (Chinese) one is only about 60-70% effective, on the other hand, and unless given away for free, it's hard to understand why any country would want it.
The concerns about Sputnik are geopolitical in nature (weakening the sanctions regime against Russia for its doings in Ukraine, and the persecution of Navalny), not sanitary ones.
Let's stop calling it Putin's vaccine. Call it what it is: Gamaleya's vaccine, a research institute that has a century of science under its belt and successful track record of breakthrough microbiology and medical research.
Yep. We've got double jabbed relatives from Argentina that are barred from travel because Sputnik V isn't approved. Yet it's one of the most effective vaccines out there.
Am Russian, am vaccinated with Sputnik V, would do it again. Yes, the study was rushed and details were missing, but, eventually, all things got in order.
And it's a real working vaccine, effects of which I see basically every day on my friends.
No, Sputnik V is a Vector vaccine just like AstraZeneca and Johnson&Johnson. There are several ones in development in China which all seem to be based on more "old school" technologies.
In terms of development they seem to be pretty far behind. As far as I know, none of the Russian or Chinese efforts have published serious data about safety and efficacy yet. According to publically available data, the vast majority of vaccinations done so far used European/American mRNA vaccines [1].
Everybody is the world is cheerleading for a non-mRNA vaccine that doesn't require negative stupid celsius to store, and the Russians still can't drive through that gigantic gap.
The Brazilian report went into quite solid detail about why they rejected the Gamaleya vaccine--read for yourself.
Russians started to clean up evidence, which points to BSL4 lab "Vector".
IMHO, this article is a part of their disinformation campaign. The name of their vaccine "Sputnik V" (Follower 5) suggests that there was "Something","Sputnik I", "Sputnik II", "Sputnik III", "Sputnik IV" before "Sputnik V".
It's impossible for Russians to produce 5 vaccines in row in such short span of time, just few months, which took billions of dollars and year of time for western companies.
IMHO, Russians started developing of their vaccine since SARS-CoV-1 outbreak in 2003.
Apologies, I meant the CanSino vaccine. Russia's Sputnik vaccine also utilizes adenovirus and I regard Russia as having one of the world's finest medical institutions.
The concerns about Sputnik are geopolitical in nature
Not entirely. Their politicians boasted about it being the world's first "registered" vaccine a month before its Phase III trial started, that was an own goal completely of their making. It was only months later where they were able to finish their Phase III trial with very good results, but a few weeks behind the two mRNA vaccines.
Well, their previous 'Sputnik', the Google alternative (sputnik.ru) failed miserably, so they're trying another one. And besides Chinese vaccine was first.
I found eg this Wired article that talks a lot about the geopolitical maneuvering of Russia/China/India in Africa and South America: https://www.wired.co.uk/article/russia-covid-vaccine-sputnik...
But really, despite a lot of pejorative language in there -- “Once they have this relationship, they can extort whatever they want” -- it just sounds like the same strategy the UK has been attempting (both politically, and in terms of vaccine development and approval), except the Russian version sounds more successful so far.
Edit to add: apologies in advance for dragging politics into this! But it seems like politics and vaccines are unfortunately intertwined.
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