As previously reported, international travel to the United States was reopened for vaccinated visitors on Monday, November 8, 2021, as a result of President Biden’s Presidential Proclamation. Previously, tourists and visitors who were physically present in the United Kingdom, Ireland, countries in the European Schengen Area, Brazil, China, India, Iran, and South Africa during the fourteen-day period preceding their entry or attempted entry into US were subject to travel restrictions as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. These restrictions, which barred entry for most non-US nationals have been officially lifted, for those who are fully vaccinated. Travel remains restricted for people who were vaccinated with non-WHO-approved vaccines, such as the Russian Sputnik V vaccine, and the Chinese CanSino vaccine.

The US Embassy in London have cancelled all the visa appointments and visa processing today (October 28, 2015) due to a “local systems” malfunction. We first received reports this morning that the Embassy sent all applicants home and told them that there would be no appointments today. At the time Embassy staff said that they would either call or email applicants to reschedule the appointments, and the Embassy has now again confirmed on their Twitter feed that all applicants would be contacted by the Visa Appointment Service for appointment rescheduling. The Embassy’s Twitter feed also confirms that the technological systems failure was localized at the London Embassy (compared to the recent global shutdown) and that the Embassy is “confident systems will be fully operational tomorrow.”