Leonid Slutsky: “The situation with the completion of the use of Sputnik V in Slovakia is a classic example of how the political situation prevailed over the need to provide the population of their own country with an effective vaccine against coronavirus.
As you remember, after the purchase of Sputnik V, it even came to the resignation of the Slovak Prime Minister, as well as the head of the country’s Ministry of Health, who were accused of purchasing a vaccine that was not approved by the European regulator. But excuse me: “Sputnik V” is approved for use already in 70 countries, at the time of the acquisition of the drug by Bratislava there were already several dozen such states, there was accumulated experience of its use. This is the first thing. Second, it is difficult to take European regulators as the ultimate truth, given the overwhelming number of reported side effects from approved vaccines.
Nevertheless, Slovakia, according to the Russian Direct Investment Fund, used all the stocks of the Sputnik V vaccine from the batch delivered at the beginning of the year, thereby indirectly confirming that it was not about taking care of its citizens when deciding to abandon the Russian vaccine. , but about blindly following the course of Brussels. Now Slovakia can only hope for Western vaccines, the prices of which have just recently risen.
By the way, the head of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen has already reported that the EU countries have supplied about 700 million doses of coronavirus vaccines to 130 countries since the beginning of the vaccination campaign. The EU is actively developing the anti-tectonic segment of the global pharmaceutical market and is definitely not interested in strong competitors.”
