Will Canada bring in mandatory on-arrival testing for travellers?
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau appeared to raise the possibility today in a brief scrum with reporters. Speaking prior to a Cabinet meeting in Ottawa, Trudeau said his government is watching the Omicron variant “very, very closely.”
“We know that even though Canada has very strong border measures now — we need vaccinations to come to Canada, we need pre-departure tests, we need testing on arrival — there may be more we need to do and we’ll be looking at it very carefully,” Trudeau said.
It wasn’t immediately clear if Trudeau was suggesting that COVID-19 arrival tests would become the new norm for returning travellers.
Canada currently requires inbound travellers to show proof of a negative molecular/PCR test taken with 72 hours of their scheduled departure. But on-arrival tests are only used on a random basis.
(Editor’s note: I’ve had four flights to Toronto from the U.S. in the past two months. I was randomly selected for on-arrival testing on two of those trips, and took a COVID-test at Toronto Pearson.)
The CBC notes that Ontario Premier Doug Ford and other leaders have urged Ottawa to introduce point-of-arrival testing for all passengers arriving to Canada, regardless of where they’re coming from.
More on-arrival testing would play well politically, but would be a strong hindrance to travel at a time when airlines and others in the tourism business are just beginning to recover from the pandemic.
As of today, only fully vaccinated travellers can board a plane or a train in Canada.
The Canadian government last week banned travellers from seven African countries: South Africa, Mozambique, Namibia, Zimbabwe, Botswana, Lesotho and Eswatini.
Other countries also have instituted travel bans in the past few days, including a ban on Canadians entering Hong Kong.
