The United States announced last week that it would soon open its doors to foreign travellers vaccinated against the coronavirus, loosening restrictions for broad swaths of global visitors for the first time since the pandemic began.
More broadly, the U.S. plan is another blow for the manufacturers of Sputnik V, which Moscow has proudly proclaimed as the first coronavirus vaccine to be registered for use. Though the vaccine was intended to be a powerful tool of pandemic diplomacy, its limited acceptance abroad and slow rates of delivery have left it behind not only Western vaccines but also those made by Chinese manufacturers.
