Spain will accept any COVID-19 vaccines as long as they are approved by the European Medicines Agency (EMA), Health Minister Carolina Darias said on Wednesday when asked if the country plans to purchase Russia's Sputnik V vaccine
MADRID (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 03rd February, 2021) Spain will accept any COVID-19 vaccines as long as they are approved by the European Medicines Agency (EMA), Health Minister Carolina Darias said on Wednesday when asked if the country plans to purchase Russia's Sputnik V vaccine.
"We will accept, with enthusiasm, any vaccine approved by the European Medicines Agency, this is the only demand, the only requirement," Darias told lawmakers.
Earlier this week, Spanish Foreign Minister Arancha Gonzalez Laya made a similar statement and also linked the possible use of Sputnik V in the country with the vaccine's approval by the EU regulator.
On Tuesday, peer-reviewed medical journal The Lancet published an interim analysis from the phase 3 trial of the Russian vaccine, showing its 91.6 percent efficacy against symptomatic COVID-19. German Chancellor Angela Merkel praised the data on Sputnik V published in The Lancet and said that Berlin will welcome any vaccines if the EMA greenlights them.
The Russian Direct Investment Fund filed an application for Sputnik V registration in the EU in January, but so far Hungary is the only member state to approve the use of the vaccine. Other EU countries have been using Pfizer and Moderna vaccines after they were approved by the EU drug regulator. The union also added AstraZeneca's vaccine to its toolbox last week, but deliveries of all three vaccines have been slow.
Sputnik V has been approved in 16 countries, including Russia, Belarus, Serbia, Argentina, Bolivia, Algeria, Palestine, Venezuela, Paraguay, Turkmenistan, Hungary, the UAE, Iran, Guinea, Tunisia and Armenia.
