MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 02nd February, 2021) Sweden and Russia maintain productive dialogue on coronavirus vaccines both at the level of health ministries and manufacturers, Foreign Minister Ann Linde said on Tuesday.
Linde is currently on a visit to Moscow as the OSCE chairperson-in-office.
"Sweden's and Russia's Ministries of Health have a constructive dialogue on various issues including vaccines. They met in December last year. I also want to highlight that there is an important cooperation between Russian and Swedish companies in this area," Linde said at a joint presser with top Russian diplomat Sergey Lavrov.
Stockholm, she went on, welcomes the "availability of several safe and effective vaccines that can meet global demand."
Russia has so far registered two homegrown COVID-19 vaccines � Sputnik V, developed by the Moscow-based Gamaleya Institute, and EpiVacCorona, created by Siberian research center Vector.
In December, the Gamaleya Institute and UK-Swedish pharma giant, AstraZeneca, signed a memorandum of understanding to test a combination of their vaccine components. The signing came after the latter's vaccine yielded a lower efficacy rate than that achieved by its peers. The Sputnik V vaccine is 91.6 percent efficient against symptomatic COVID-19, according to the latest interim analysis from phase 3 trials.
