Competitive behavior“We see this as part of competitive behavior by some western pharma companies that want to dominate the vaccine market and do not want to have competition," RDIF head Kirill Dmitriev said. “The Ministry of Health of Russia will follow all of the required procedures for approval, no corners will be cut."Scores of Russia’s business and political elite have already been given access to the experimental vaccine as early as April, according to people familiar with the effort.
Military volunteers completed Phase 2 trials in July, according to the Defense Ministry. The results haven’t been published in a peer-reviewed journal.Researchers and pharmaceutical companies in other countries including the US, the UK, Japan and China.