Vaccine and Biological Production Company No.1 (VABIOTECH), one of Vietnam’s leading pharmaceutical companies, has produced the first batch of Russia’s Sputnik V Covid-19 vaccine under the technology transfer.

Sputnik V Covid-19 vaccine. Photo: AFP/VNA

The first validation samples taken from the produced batch will be shipped to the Gamaleya Center for quality control, according to the Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF), a sovereign wealth fund of Russia that is also in charge of the tech transfer.

RDIF’s CEO Kirill Dmitriev said: "RDIF and VABIOTECH are actively cooperating in the technology transfer process to provide easier access to Sputnik V for the population of Vietnam."

Dr. Do Tuan Dat, president of VABIOTECH, said “It is our great pleasure to work with RDIF to bring Sputnik V to Vietnam to fight the pandemic. We hope the cooperation between RDIF and VABIOTECH will help provide quality and affordable Covid-19 vaccine to Vietnam and other Southeast Asian countries.”

Produced by the Gamaleya National Center of Epidemiology and Microbiology, Sputnik V is a two-dose vaccine based on a proven and well-studied platform of human adenoviral vectors and uses two different vectors for the two shots in a course of vaccination, providing immunity with a longer duration than vaccines using the same delivery mechanism for both shots.

On March 23, 2021, Vietnam’s Ministry of Health approved the Sputnik V vaccine for emergency use.

In early June, Vietnam’s President Nguyen Xuan Phuc sent a letter to Russia's President Vladimir Putin to ask for further support in vaccine supply and tech transfer.

On June 8, Valentina Matviyenko, Chairwoman of the Federation Council, the upper house of the Russian Federation, said on a phone talk with the Vietnamese Chairman of the National Assembly Vuong Dinh Hue that Russia is considering tech transfer of Sputnik V Covid-19 vaccine to Vietnam.

On July 12, the Vietnamese Government agreed to allow private conglomerate T&T Group to import 40 million doses of Russia’s Sputnik V Covid-19 vaccine. T&T will use its own money to buy the doses, which will be administered free of charge by the government.

To date, the Sputnik V shot, widely used in Russia and approved for use in 68 countries. However, the vaccine has not been licensed by the World Health Organization (WHO) yet.

In mid-May, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres appealed to the WHO to approve the use of Sputnik V. He pointed out that the UN has called on all its employees to be vaccinated with the Russian vaccine in countries where it has been approved.

RDIF, the group responsible for marketing the vaccine worldwide, reported that the efficacy of Sputnik V is 97.6% based on the analysis of data on the coronavirus infection rate among those in Russia vaccinated with both components of Sputnik V from December 5, 2020, to March 31, 2021.