Emirates approves Phase III trials of Russian Sputnik V vaccine
The Ministry of Health of the United Arab Emirates approved the third phase of clinical trials of the coronavirus vaccine "Sputnik V" in the country, the Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF) reports.
The trials will be supported by PureHealth, a leading provider of laboratory services in the UAE, and supervised by the Abu Dhabi Department of Health and the Ministry of Health and Prevention. The Abu Dhabi Health Services Company (SEHA) will process medical protocols.
As part of the clinical trials in the Arab country, volunteers will be under medical supervision for 90 days after receiving the Russian coronavirus vaccine.
The Fund's Director-General, Kiril Dmitriev, has applauded the decision of the Emirates' leaders, while stressing that "the UAE has demonstrated one of the most advanced approaches in the world to combat the coronavirus pandemic.".“As part of the Phase III trials of the Sputnik V vaccine, we are planning to expand in several other countries over the coming months, and we are delighted that the UAE will be the first country in which we do so in the Middle East,” Dmitriev added.
For his part, Abdul Rahman bin Mohammed al-Owais, the Emirates' minister of health and prevention, stressed his country's suitability for vaccine research "thanks to the diverse nature of its populace", as well as its "world-class medical infrastructure, including cutting edge digital technologies that can be harnessed to progress a trial".
The Russian Sputnik V vaccine - registered on August 11 in full compliance with international standards - was created artificially, without any element of the coronavirus in its composition, is presented in lyophilized form, as a powder that is mixed with an excipient to dissolve it and then administer it intramuscularly.
This vaccine employs two different human adenoviral vectors, Ad5 and Ad26, for a first and a second injection. It is worth mentioning that Sputnik V does not contain live human adenoviruses, but human adenovirus vectors, that is, human viruses that cannot multiply in the body and are completely safe, as explained in the Russian RT media.
Sputnik V is based on an existing two-vector vaccine platform developed in 2015 for Ebola fever, which went through all phases of clinical trials and was used to defeat the Ebola epidemic in Africa in 2017. It was among the ten vaccines closest to completion of clinical trials, according to the WHO, and is the only one on this main list that uses two different vectors for different injections. More than 40 countries have already expressed interest in obtaining the vaccine.
On September 9 the third phase of clinical trials of Sputnik V began, involving 40,000 people, 10,000 of whom will receive a placebo to test its effectiveness.
The prestigious scientific journal The Lancet published a medical article with the results of the first two phases of the Russian vaccine clinical trials, which showed that all the volunteers acquired "stable immunity" to COVID-19.