DISINFO: The European Union turned out to be an organisation with no strategy at all, attacking Sputnik V just because it is Russian.
SUMMARY
With regards to what the European Union now says about Sputnik V, they always say bad things about [Russia], and they will continue to do so.
How can a curative preventive drug be a threat? This is nonsense, and is the talk of the helpless. During the pandemic, the European Union turned out to be an organisation with no strategy at all.
RESPONSE
Pro-Kremlin disinformation narrative trying to link the Sputnik V authorisation process to Russophobia.
Criticism and mistrust of the Sputnik V vaccine were not due to any alleged Russophobia but to the publication of incomplete or questionable data about it, surrounded by a disinformation campaign about this and other vaccines.
This campaign was launched after the original announcement about the Sputnik V was met with scepticism and criticism even by Russian specialists in the country. Experts' reports conclude that Russia has perceived the development of a coronavirus vaccine in terms of geopolitical and economic gain.
Reservations and criticism of the Russian Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine stem from the fact that Russia did not complete large trials to test the vaccine’s safety and efficacy before releasing it. Rolling out an inadequately vetted vaccine could endanger people who receive it. On September 4, 2020, scientists of the Gamaleya Institute responsible for the creation of the Sputnik V published an article in the scientific publication The Lancet showing results from phases 1 and 2 trials, which was immediately touted by pro-Kremlin media as the ultimate validation of the vaccine. However, the data was denounced as flawed by a group of prominent scientists and doctors headed by Enrico Bucci, a biology professor at Temple University in the U.S. Bucci warned about strange patterns in the data, such as duplicate values for different groups of patients, which he considered highly improbable.
On February 2, 2021, interim results from a phase 3 trial of the Sputnik V COVID-19 vaccine were finally published in The Lancet. The trial results show a consistent strong protective effect across all participant age groups, meaning that the Sputnik V vaccine candidate appears safe and effective. This is what led to a general change in the approach towards the Sputnik V. All vaccines, authorised by the European Medicines Agency are welcome in the EU. The EMA has initiated the rolling review of the vaccine on the 4 March, 2021, and the decisionwill be fully decided on scientific not political basis.
The EMA is committed to applying the same regulatory approach and scientific rigour to all vaccine applications that meet European requirements for safety, efficacy and quality and is in dialogue with more than 50 vaccine developers from across the globe, including the Sputnik V developers from Russia.
See other examples of these pro-Kremlin disinformation narratives in our database, such as claims that Western attacks on the Russian coronavirus vaccine are a corporate cold war against humanity or "Russian progress in COVID-19 vaccine has become for the West an outrageous challenge, that Sputnik V is a target of the corporate cold war; that the West wants to discredit the Sputnik V; that the WHO and Microsoft sabotaged the Russian vaccine, that the West criticises the Sputnik V because it can’t accept Russia’s primacy and because its pharmaceutical companies will lose billions of dollars.