April 15 (SeeNews) - Serbia expects the first doses of the Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine produced at the Torlak institute in Belgrade to be ready for delivery to hospitals in June, President Aleksandar Vucic said on Thursday.
"We will complete the packaging of the first vaccines by May 15. We will need to wait for 21 days after that. The first vaccines will leave Torlak between June 10 and 15," Vucic said in a video file posted on the website of Tanjug news agency.
On Wednesday, the Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF) said Serbia started production of the Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine at the Torlak institute in Belgrade.
Later during the day, Serbian media quoted the minister without portfolio in charge of innovation Nenad Popovic as saying that Torlak produced the first test doses of the vaccine, while regular production will start by May 20.
Serbia has become the first country in Southern Europe to produce Sputnik V and the vaccine could be exported to other countries in the region at a later stage, RDIF said on Wednesday.
"Since the beginning of the year, Sputnik V has been actively used to vaccinate the population of the country, and the scale of vaccination may significantly increase thanks to the launch of local production," the CEO of RDIF, Kirill Dmitriev, said.
Torlak Institute is Serbia's national vaccine producer.