Vladimir Putin in a Siberian forest, in March 2021. – Alexei Druzhinin / TASS
President Vladimir Putin said Wednesday to aim for collective immunity against Covid-19 in Russia in the fall, welcoming in particular the scientific advances of his country. “Vaccination is of capital importance today”, he declared during his major annual speech on the State of the Nation.
“Our scientists have made a real breakthrough. Russia now has three reliable vaccines against the coronavirus, ”including its flagship injection, Sputnik V, continued Vladimir Putin. Noting the “restraint” of his compatriots who “respected exhausting precautionary measures”, he called on them to be vaccinated, while the immunization campaign is experiencing slowness in Russia, against a background of mistrust of the population.
“Keep all borders under control”
President Putin has also said he wants to “keep all borders under control to slow the spread” of the virus. These optimistic remarks come however the day after concerns of the mayor of Moscow, Sergei Sobyanin, who noted a deterioration of the epidemiological situation in the capital.
Sergei Sobyanin said he wanted to launch “a program to stimulate the vaccination of the elderly” to avoid harsh containment measures as in Europe. Moscow has recorded some 2,000 new cases daily in recent days, and Russia between 8,000 and 9,000 cases every day in April.
One of the most battered countries in the world
To protect the economy, the capital and the rest of the country did not introduce containment during the second wave that hit Russia head-on in the fall of 2020. According to the Gamaleïa institute, which created the vaccine Sputnik V, 3.8 million people, for a country of 146 million people, received both doses.
The mortality figures diverge sharply depending on the sources: the government recognized 106,706 deaths on Wednesday, when the statistics agency Rosstat had identified at least 224,000 at the end of February, which places Russia among the most damaged countries in the world.