Brazil's national health regulator said Thursday its decision to reject the Russian-made Sputnik V vaccine was based on the developer's own data, after the latter threatened to sue for defamation.
The Brazilian agency, Anvisa, based the decision on evidence the vaccine carried a live version of a common cold-causing virus -- information it said "was submitted by the Sputnik V vaccine developer itself."
The decision to deny emergency use authorization for the vaccine, announced Monday, has blown up into an all-out international row.
Sputnik V said earlier Thursday it was "undertaking a legal defamation proceeding in Brazil against Anvisa for knowingly spreading false and inaccurate information."
"Anvisa made incorrect and misleading statements without having tested the actual Sputnik V vaccine," it tweeted.
The regulator fired back defensively in a press conference.
"Anvisa was accused of lying, of acting unethically, of disseminating fake news about replicating adenovirus," said the agency's director, Antonio Barra Torres.
"We refute this grave accusation."
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
