Early data indicates that a Covid vaccine developed by Russia is more than 90 per cent effective, officials from the country said this morning.
Western scientists said that the technology behind the Sputnik V vaccine was credible and that the interim results were a welcome further sign that it was possible to produce effective vaccines.
However, they also warned that efficacy of the Russian jab was uncertain because only 20 people in a final-stage trial had tested positive for the coronavirus. Some experts are suspicious that data may have been released prematurely, in an attempt to steal the thunder of the US drugmaker Pfizer, which announced positive vaccine results on Monday.
The Russian results came from a cohort of more than 16,000 volunteers who
