Russian Direct Investment Fund announced on Wednesday that Russia's single-dose Sputnik Light Covid 19 vaccine will be launched in India by December 2021, according to Kirill Dmitriev, CEO, Russian Direct Investment Fund.
India's drug regulators refused to grant emergency authorisation to the Russian-made vaccine in July and ruled out the need for the conduct of the phase 3 trial. In September, the Drugs Controller General of India DCGI had granted permission to Dr Reddy's Laboratory Limited to conduct phase 3 bridging trials.
The Russian government allowed the export of Russia's single-dose COVID 19 vaccine Sputnik Light domestically, according to earlier reports. According to the news agency PTI, the Indian drug firm Hetero Biopharma Limited has been allowed to export 40 lakh doses of Sputnik Light to Russia.
Sputnik Light is the same as component 1 of the Russian vaccine Sputnik V that is being used in India's anti-COVID inoculation programme after getting emergency use authorization from India's Drug Regulator in April.
RDIF is working with the authorities to get the Sputnik Light registered in India, together with Dr Reddy's Laboratories.
The single-dose Sputnik Light vaccine demonstrated 79.4 percent efficacy, according to data taken from 28 days after the injection was administered as part of Russia's mass vaccination program between December 5, 2020 and April 15, 2021. An efficacy level of almost 80 percent is higher than that of many two-dose vaccines.
Sputnik Light has proven effective against all new strains of coronaviruses, as demonstrated by the Gamaleya Center during laboratory tests, a press release from RDIF had said on May 6.
The data from San Marino's Ministry of Health on Sputnik V vaccine showed that it is 80% effective against COVID 19 from 6th to 8th months after administering the second dose.