"Today #30May, 500 thousand doses of Sputnik-V vaccines arrived, the product of Russia's effort in the battle to defeat Covid-19. I thank [Russian] President [Vladimir] Putin and the Russian people," Maduro said on Twitter on Sunday.
According to the Venezuelan leader, coronavirus vaccination will be stepped up in the month of June. The Sputnik V vaccines will be used to give shots to people over 60 with underlying health conditions.
Venezuela started its mass coronavirus vaccination campaign earlier this year after it received the first batch of Russia’s Sputnik V vaccines in February.
In August 2020, Russia became the first country in the world to register a vaccine against the coronavirus, dubbed Sputnik V, and developed by the Gamaleya research institute. So far, the vaccine has been approved for emergency use in 66 countries.
According to an interim analysis from a trial published in The Lancet medical journal, the vaccine has 91.6 percent efficacy. Meanwhile, the Gamaleya National Research Center of Epidemiology and Microbiology and the Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF) have reported that Sputnik V has 97.6 percent efficacy.
