Russian vaccine | Brazil to produce Sputnik V and export to Argentina

Brazil will start producing Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine next Friday, January 15, and export it to countries that have already approved it, such as Argentina and Bolivia. The production will be in charge of the pharmaceutical company Unión Química in a laboratory in Brasilia.

The company’s director of international affairs, Rogério Rosso, said the Russian vaccine will only be exported to countries in the region whose regulators have already approved it. The national health ministry did so at the end of December after Anmat approved an emergency recommendation. The first 300,000 doses reached the country on December 24, and five days later the health worker vaccination campaign began.

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In the case of Brazil, the Chemical Union is awaiting authorization from the National Health Surveillance Agency (Anvisa) to begin phase 3 tests and thus assess its efficacy and possible side effects in the vaccinated population. Last week, the Brazilian health entity asked the company for more information to authorize the tests.

CNN Brazil reported that a Chemical Union delegation will visit Russia on Monday 11 to validate the vaccine manufacturing process in Brazil. The members of the mission will hold several meetings with the Gamaleya Institute which is developing the vaccine and with the Investment Fund which has financed the research and its production.

According to the report, the pharmaceutical company wants to promote emergency use of the vaccine as soon as the Brazilian health entity authorizes clinical trials.

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“We are fighting a lot for this record and we will give priority to Brazil when Anvisa publishes” the tests. “But Chemical Union is Sputnik’s representative in Latin America and we expect other countries to register the vaccine in the coming days, ”said Rosso.

According to him, it will be the first vaccine against COVID-9 to be produced entirely in Brazil, with a full transfer of technology. “We plan to produce 8 million doses per month in the first half of the year“Of the year,” he said.

// Bolivia registers Sputnik V vaccine in emergency

Russian confirmation

The news was also confirmed by Russian news agency Sputnik. In a dispatch from Rio de Janeiro, the agency announced that the vaccine would begin to be manufactured in Brazil “in the coming days”.

According to sources from the Chemical Union Laboratory in Sputkin, “with the arrival of supplies on January 6 from Russia, Chemical Union will begin manufacturing the vaccine in the next few days.”