I think the US will see the geopolitical consequences of this in years to come . In many Latin American countries it has not gone unnoticed that the first shipments to arrive in their country had a Russian or a Chinese flag on them. Not saying that it will be dramatic, but American diplomats are going to have to work overtime.
Let's see if the US releasing Astra can redress this.
Indeed. People forget that between democracies, diplomacy is often your interactions with the other country's political system. So in Latin American countries there are already many parties that are ideologically unfriendly towards the US. In internal deliberations in the future about partnering more with the US vs China, those who ideologically might be more inclined to favor the US can't do anything to counter the argument that the US proved an unreliable partner during this search for vaccines, while China was actually reliable. I definitely think that holding onto the AZ vaccine stockpile for so long was a mistake.
Interesting that even with the pandemic in full bloom, Brasil's regulator has issues with Sputnik. Have the countries that approved it really done their homework with the paperwork?
The regulator was even hesitant to approve Sinovac (called Coronavac in Br) back in January iirc, but that was more related to the low efficacy observed (50% against any infection at all, but 100% against severe cases). At the time though, if they'd rejected the vaccine it would have been a death sentence for Brazil's only vaccine production line already set-up and producing that vaccine, and would likely have left the country with no vaccines for another 2 months.
Right now the situation is not as tight as far as production, with Coronavac still being produced and also another firm producing licensed AZ vaccine that will make up most of the numbers through about September. Then there's a contract to receive significant numbers of Pfizer vaccines through the end of the year and into next.