Putin vaccinated with Sputnik V

Moscow: President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday told the people that he had been vaccinated with the domestically-made Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine, as officials are urging people to receive their vaccine in the midst of the pandemic.

In the earlier phase, Kremlin had stated that Putin, aged 68 years had completed both the doses of the vaccine in the months of March and April but did not reveal any details further, and neither did publicize any image of the president taking the vaccine.

This month, the deficiency in publicity came to the limelight as officials were worried over the slow pace of the vaccination drive, which is easily available, and started encouraging the people to complete their vaccination procedure.

At the annual televised question and answer session, questions were raised as to which vaccine the president took.

He couldn’t disclose the name of the vaccine so that it doesn’t get any undue advantages. But he said that it was Sputnik V, one among the four vaccines of Russia. Moscow did not give any approval to any foreign vaccines.

He added, “I thought that I needed to be protected for as long as possible. So I choose to be vaccinated with Sputnik V. The military is getting vaccinated with Sputnik V, and after all I’m the commander-in-chief”.

“After the first shot, I didn’t feel anything at all. About four hours later, there was some tenderness where I had the shot. I did the second at midday. At midnight, I measured my temperature. It was 37.2 (Celsius). I went to sleep, woke up and my temperature was 36.6. That was it.”

“I don’t support mandatory vaccination, and I continue to hold this point of view.”

Kremlin opined that in this week, Russia would lag behind its aim to provide vaccination to 60% of the people by autumn as uptake was weak.

On Wednesday, Russia registered 669 mortalities, the highest recorded number since the outbreak of the pandemic. There were 21,042 fresh cases within 24 hours and that includes 5,823 from Moscow.