Russia has agreed to sell its Sputnik V COVID-19 vaccine to Thailand, under a government-to-government deal, Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha said in his Facebook post on Thursday.
He said the Russian Foreign Ministry has informed its Thai counterpart that President Vladimir Putin had approved the sale of the vaccine, as requested by the Thai government, citing the historically friendly relationship between the two countries.
The prime minister did not say how many doses of the Russian vaccine will be procured, but they will be part of the additional 35 million doses to be purchased by Thailand, in addition to China’s Sinovac and AstraZeneca, which was jointly developed by the UK and Sweden.
Recently, the Gamaleya National Research Center of Epidemiology and Microbiology and the Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF) reported that the Sputnik V vaccine showed a 97.6% efficacy according to analysis of data on the infection rate those in Russia vaccinated with both components of Sputnik V.
The report stated that according to data from 3.8 million Russians, who received both components of Sputnik V between December 5th last year and 31st March this year, as part of the mass civil inoculation drive, revealed an infection rate of 0.027% from the 35th day of receiving the first dose.
