Russia signs more deals with India to produce 300-million Sputnik V vaccines

New Delhi : More deals have been signed between India and Russia as the former has been assigned a task to produce around 300-million doses of Sputnik V coronavirus vaccines next year. The new number is three times the earlier known figure as new deals have been signed with more manufacturers in the nation.

Russia is already testing the first samples of Sputnik V that were produced in India, its embassy in New Delhi said on Twitter on Friday, sharing a news story in which their vaccine czar Kirill Dmitriev was quoted.

"In India, we have agreements with four large manufacturers," Dmitriev, the head of the Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF) told Rossiya 24 TV, according to news agency TASS.

"India will produce about 300 million doses or more of the vaccine for us next year."

India's Hetero Biopharma had made an announcement that they will be producing around 100-million doses of Sputnik V, which is 91% effective on coronavirus.

Meanwhile, it is not clear that which Indian companies have been assigned the agreement of manufacturing the future doses of the vaccine.

India's health ministry on Friday reported 22,890 new coronavirus infections, taking its total to just shy of 10 million. It is the world's second-worst affected country after the United States, which has recorded 16.9 million cases.

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