Volunteers for testing vaccine for COVID-19 to meet more than 20 requirements — expert

In particular, pregnant women and people with chronic diseases are banned from vaccine tests, the CEO of the research center of virology and biotechnology Vector, Rinat Maksyutov, told TASS in an interview.

«Participating in clinical research will be volunteers officially recognized as healthy after a series of standard clinical, laboratory and instrumental examinations. The body mass index will be taken into account. Persons with contraindications to vaccination are excluded from testing. For vaccines against COVID-19 there exist 22 contraindications, such as pregnancy, breastfeeding, chronic diseases during the acute phase and some others,» he said, TASS reports.

Earlier, Maksyutov said more than 300 volunteers had applied for participation in clinical tests, scheduled to begin at the end of June. All volunteers give written consent to the related procedures.

«According to the draft of the vaccination procedure the volunteers will be taken to the hospital for 24 hours and discharged the next day if no undesirable phenomena occur. After that all volunteers will stay under daily outpatient observation for a period of seven days. Then they will be visiting the outpatient research center on certain dates after vaccination,» Maksyutov said.

All vaccinated volunteers will be monitored by a medical researcher for possible undesirable reactions for a period of six months. There are no plans for isolating the volunteers, Maksyutov stressed.

«All those who participate in the clinical research will be paid a remuneration,» he concluded.

To date, a total of 362,342 coronavirus cases have been confirmed in Russia, with 131,129 patients having recovered from the disease. Russia’s latest data indicates 3,807 fatalities nationwide. Earlier, the Russian government set up an Internet hotline to keep the public updated on the coronavirus situation.