Vladimir Putin is claiming that Russia is the first country in the world to develop an approved coronavirus vaccine and that one of his daughters has already been inoculated.
After less than two months of human testing, Mr Putin said on Tuesday that Russia's Covid-19 vaccine underwent the necessary tests and it offers a lasting immunity from the virus.
The Russian President stressed during a government meeting that the vaccine was proven safe to use.
Speaking at a government meeting, Mr Putin emphasised that the vaccine has undergone proper testing and proven safe to use.
He said: “I would like to repeat that it has passed all the necessary tests. The most important thing is to ensure full safety of using the vaccine and its efficiency.”
The Russian leader added that one of his two daughters has received two shots of the vaccine and is feeling well. “She has taken part in the experiment,” Mr Putin said.
Mr Putin said his daughter had a temperature of 38C on the day of the first vaccine injection, and then it dropped to just over 37C on the following day. After the second shot she again had a slight increase in temperature, but then it was all over.
“She’s feeling well and has high number of antibodies,” Mr Putin added. He did not specify which of his two daughters, Maria or Katerina, received the vaccine.
However, scientists have been sounding the alarm that the rush to start using the vaccine before Phase 3 trials, which normally last for months and involve thousands of people, could backfire.
Russian authorities have said that medical workers, teachers and other risk groups will be the first to be inoculated.
Mr Putin emphasised that the vaccination will be voluntary.
Russian officials have said that large-scale production of the vaccine will start in September, and mass vaccination may begin as early as October.
The World Health Organisation said all vaccine candidates should go through full stages of testing before being rolled out.
Experts have warned that vaccines that are not properly tested can cause harm in many ways – from a negative impact on health to creating a false sense of security or undermining trust in vaccinations.
Danny Altmann, professor of immunology at Imperial College London, said there are many vaccines in development around the world and there is an interest in it all being a truly open.
He added: “While information on the vast majority of the vaccines and trial protocols in the world have been made available, there seems to be rather little detail thus far on the Russian candidates, except for a protocol on Clintrials.gov, which seemed to suggest an adenovirus vector.
“The bar is necessarily set very high for criteria that must be satisfied for approval after Phase 3 clinical trials. The collateral damage from release of any vaccine that was less than safe and effective would exacerbate our current problems insurmountably.
“I hope these criteria have been followed. We are all in this together.”
Keith Neal, emeritus professor of the epidemiology of infectious diseases, University of Nottingham, said without the submission of scientific papers for analysis it was impossible to establish the effectiveness of the Russian vaccine.
He added that there may be problems on data quality.
“Using the figures from www.worldometer.com an infection rate of 5,000 per day equates to one per 1,000 a month in Russia and this may be significantly under-reported," said Professor Neal.
“This will be higher in Moscow and probably health care workers. If 25,000 people were recruited in each arm then we would expect 25 cases in one month in the control group.
“Any figure less than 15 Covid-19 cases in the vaccine arm would be significant.
“Given the size of the Russian population, recruiting 50,000 people is well deliverable. Only 12,500 for two months gives the same results."
Additional reporting by PA Media.