UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Thursday called on the World Health Organization to approve the use of Russia’s Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine, stressing its crucial role in fighting the virus.
Guterres pointed out that the UN has called on all its employees to be vaccinated with the Russian vaccine in countries where it has been approved.
Global infections have exceeded 160 million since the onset of the pandemic.
The Russian Direct Investment Fund, the group responsible for marketing the vaccine worldwide, reported that it had received orders for more than 1.2 billion doses of the vaccine as of December 2020.
The jab has a reported 91 percent efficacy rate and has been approved for emergency use in dozens of countries around the world.
Edited translation from Al-Masry Al-Youm
