Russia gifts Sputnik V Covid-19 vaccine to Vietnam
Russian Security Council Secretary Nikolai Patrushev has handed over a batch of Sputnik V Covid-19 vaccine gifted by his government to Vietnam.
The donation was handed over Tuesday during his two-day visit to Hanoi for Russia-Vietnam security consultations.
Dang Viet Hung, head of the International Cooperation Department under the Health Ministry, said the batch has been transferred to a cold storage facility at the National Institute of Hygiene and Epidemiology for preservation.
An official from the ministry, who requested anonymity, said the batch contains 1,000 doses of the vaccine produced by Generium JSC.
The vaccine is administered in two shots three weeks apart, has to be stored at minus 18 degrees Celsius or below and has a six-month shelf life. According to The Lancet medical journal, the vaccine is 91.6 percent effective.
Vietnam last month approved Russia’s Sputnik V Covid-19 vaccines for use in emergencies.
Last year, Deputy Health Minister Tran Van Thuan said Vietnam ordered to buy Sputnik V Covid-19 vaccine from Russia but he didn’t reveal the specific figure.
The mass vaccination in Vietnam began on March 8, and so far nearly 16,000 medical staff and other frontline workers in 12 localities have received their first shot of the AstraZeneca vaccine developed by the British-Swedish company in collaboration with Oxford University.
Some of them suffered from anaphylaxis, but returned to stable health soon after.
By Thuc Linh & Le Nga – VnExpress.net – March 16, 2021