Russian institute says country negotiates production of covid vaccine in Brazil

Russian scientists responsible for the development of a vaccine against covid-19 said in a press conference held on the morning of Thursday, 20, that already negotiate with Brazil and with some other countries the massive production of the new immunizer. SputnikV, which obtained a provisional registration earlier this month, is beginning to be mass tested in the coming days and would offer immunity against the new coronavirus for two years. "We are talking to other countries, such as India, Brazil, South Korea and Cuba," said Alexander Gintsburg, director of the Gamaleya Institute for Research in Epidemiology and Microbiology in Russia, where the SputnikV vaccine was developed. "They have the potential to produce the vaccine, to serve as a hub, basis, for production." According to Gintsburg, the Russians' priority will be to negotiate with countries that want to produce the immunizer and have the capacity to do so. However, he said, there are also plans to export the vaccine. During the press conference held this morning, Russian scientists said that mass tests of the Sputnik vaccine will begin in the coming days on 40,000 people. At the same time, they explained, more vulnerable groups, such as health professionals working on the front line, will already be vaccinated. According to Denis Logunov, deputy scientific director of the Gamaleya Institute for Research in Epidemiology and Microbiology, the Russian vaccine has been tested on several animals, such as rabbits, rats and two types of monkeys, without presenting any side effects. Later, he said, it was also tested in a group of 220 human volunteers, aged 18 to 60 years. The participants had a positive immune response and the reported side effects were mild, such as headaches. According to Russian scientists, these tests would correspond to phases 1 and 2 of the tests. "The volunteers are producing antibodies, their organisms have reacted well and all have shown a good immune response," Logunov said. The Russians explained that they were able to get a vaccine so quickly because they were working on another similar immunization, the Vaccine against Mers - the Middle Eastern respiratory syndrome, also caused by a coronavirus. According to them, the vaccine had already reached phase 2, revealing safety and immune response. On the other hand, they had also developed, in 2014, from the same methodology, an Ebola vaccine, which was tested, in phase three, in more than two thousand people. The technology used is to use two types of human adenoviruses (which do not cause any disease) that serve as vectors to carry into the body genetic fragments of a sars-cov2 crown protein. The vaccine is given in two doses, with an interval of 21 days. The Russians believe she can offer immunity for two years. "With all this data and based on the fact that the adenovirus platform has been used before in 20,000 people, we have obtained the registration of our vaccine, which allows us to produce the vaccine for the risk groups, people who are at higher risk of being affected by the virus," Logunov explained. "But we are obliged to do more clinical trials, we have already agreed a protocol of 40,000 people, to check the degree of effectiveness of the vaccine. We will then have the definitive record, and we can begin mass production."