Prof Nikolai Petrovsky claims he will be sacked for insisting on taking his own vaccine

A Covid-19 vaccine developed in Adelaide will be rolled out in the Middle East before it is used here – and its developer claims he is facing the sack.

A new Covid-19 vaccine developed in Adelaide has been approved for use in Iran amid claims Australian authorities have “ignored” the study.

Flinders University Professor Nikolai Petrovsky, the lead researcher, announced the new deal on Tuesday after successful stage 3 trials.

Prof Petrovksy claims he faces the sack from his workplace at Flinders Medical Centre for insisting on only taking his own vaccine – which has not yet been approved in Australia.

He has launched an online crowdfunding scheme to apply to the federal regulator the Therapeutic Goods Administration, for approval.

The researcher, who claimed the federal government had “ignored him”, would not disclose his vaccine’s effectiveness, which other foreign governments he was talking with, nor what medical journal his results would be published in.

Prof Petrovsky said it would be in use in Iran in the “coming week”.

Flinders University Professor Nikolai Petrovsky claims he is being “ignored” by the federal government. Picture: Matt Turner

“The one government that seems to have deaf ears is our own,” he said.

A federal Health Department spokeswoman said his claims of being ignored “are absolutely and categorically rejected”.

“All Covid-19 vaccine applications are being treated with the greatest priority,” she said.