The President of Russia has announced today that they have managed to produce a working vaccine for the corona virus. He says his own daughter has already had the vaccine administered to her. There are no side effects and the vaccine is effective.

Why shouldn’t we believe him?

Many will take this announcement with a pinch of salt. Although there is always a chance that the claims are true, the odds, I think, are against it.

Firstly, the scientific data is not available for verification. If I have learned one thing about the scientific community over the last 15 years, it is that data supporting claims like this should be capable of being replicated independently and verified. Until that happens, no self-respecting scientist would or could endorse such findings. That does not mean the findings are false, simply that we only have the word of a national leader.

If I were to claim I had won the lottery yesterday even though the winner had chosen for anonymity at the lottery company, you would only believe my claim if there was some evidence to back it up. Buying a luxury villa somewhere would increase the credibility of my claim; no change at all in my life-style would seriously discredit my story.

Secondly, the development cycle of a vaccine is normally much longer than would have been the case in Russia. There is a worldwide race to produce a vaccine in record time and testing programmes have been seriously reduced in length accordingly. Nonetheless, the WHO has guidelines on the third stage testing (= on human test subjects) which, it would appear, have not been followed in Russia. Without evidence to the contrary, I doubt if Russian scientists were able to perfect a vaccine any earlier than colleagues in other countries, where reliable third stage testing is not expected to provide conclusive results for several months yet. Even once testing has been successfully concluded, scaling up production sufficient for vaccination programmes will take another few months.

Thirdly, if Russians were vaccinated on a large scale, would we have access to the results in the long-term? Would the evidence that the vaccine works in practice be made available? I somehow doubt it.

Fourthly, does Russia have any other agenda here other than wiping out the corona virus? Do not forget, at the beginning of the crisis, Russia denied they had any corona infections at all, only to admit a short time later that they did in fact have similar infection patterns as in other countries. Russia does not always provide correct information through official channels. They would certainly revel in the achievement of a working vaccine ahead of other countries, as would, for example, the United States.

Is public health at the top of their agenda, or kudos? Worse still, would they initiate a new power-play with other countries with the inclusion of the vaccine in the mix?

Once Western European countries make a vaccine available to its citizens, I expect to read clear signals from the broader scientific community about the composition and efficacy of it. Make no mistake, there will be various vaccines on the market during the coming year. There will almost certainly be differences in the performance and behaviour of these vaccines. It is like that only one will be made available on the health service, while others may be available to be purchased online.

The evidence presented to us will be important, although most people will not research the background for themselves. They will rely on the media, social media and official announcements. It would be nice to think Russia’s claims today are correct, but forgive me if I prefer to reserve judgement for a while yet.