Ontario Premier Doug Ford says Canada’s provincial premiers will discuss mandatory testing for visitors arriving from the United States.
“We’re going to be super cautious; everything is on the table,” Ford told reporters today at the opening of a new hospital in Mississauga, Ontario. “We’ll sit down and discuss that.”
“It doesn’t take much to get a test at the airport,” he said.
Ford said he was pleased that the Trudeau government on Tuesday announced it will require on-arrival testing for all passengers coming from destinations other than the U.S. That’s in addition to requiring visitors and Canadians to be fully vaccinated, and also in addition to requiring pre-flight PCR tests for COVID-19.
Ford said the request for more testing came from his government, and he singled out federal Intergovernmental Affairs Minister Dominic LeBlanc for his cooperation.
It’s critical that Canada control its borders, because “it (the omicron variant) is coming in from other countries,” he said.
The U.S. announced its first Omicron variant case today, an arriving passenger in San Francisco who recently visited South Africa.
The Trudeau government on Tuesday announced that anyone coming into Canada from a country other than the U.S. will have to be tested at the airport and isolate until they get their results. That applies to all travellers, even those who are double vaccinated, said Health Minister Jean-Yves Duclos. The new rule also applies to Canadians and permanent residents of Canada.
The on-arrival tests are in addition to the PCR-style tests that anyone has to take within 72 hours of their scheduled departure for Canada.
Expanding that to passengers arriving from the U.S. would be a substantial load increase for airport testing sights. It’s also unclear how it might work at busy land border crossings.
Federal Transport Minister Omar Alghabra today said it’s too early to say if Canada will require tests from those coming in from the U.S.
“We need to be prepared and ready if we need to adjust that decision to include travellers from the U.S. We haven’t made that decision yet,” he said.
