Today is a day to celebrate for Canadian travellers, and for anyone wishing to visit Canada. But it’ll be even better two weeks from now. The Canadian government today (March 17) announced that mandatory border tests for fully vaccinated residents and visitors will be dropped as of April 1. That means Canadians can travel out of the country and not have to worry about finding an expensive COVID-19 test. They also don’t have to worry that they’ll be denied entry to the country because of a positive test result. It also means foreign visitors can avoid pricey tests Read more
rapid tests
By Jim Byers Member, Society of American Travel Writers (SATW) Canadian medical and business leaders are asking the Trudeau government to remove pre-departure testing entirely for fully vaccinated travellers. Speaking at an event in Calgary today, members of the Canadian Travel and Tourism Roundtable and other experts called on Ottawa to make the change on or before April 1, when the regulations will be updated. Continued testing targeted at solely the travel sector is both unnecessary and not rooted in science, they said. “While the federal government took a step in the right direction by altering the testing regime around Read more
Starting today (Feb. 28), fully vaccinated travellers no longer have to take a PCR-style test to enter Canada. Federal Health Minister Jean-Yves Duclos last week announced that travellers will still be required to take a pre-arrival test before entering Canada. But the Trudeau government now will allow fully vaccinated Canadians and foreign visitors to provide results from a rapid antigen test, which can be purchased more easily than PCR or molecular-style tests, and are a fraction of the cost. The government initially said rapid tests will have to be taken with 24 hours of a scheduled departure to Canada or Read more
WestJet and the Tourism Industry Association of Canada say they welcome today’s announced changes to Canada’s travel rules. But both groups, along with the Association of Canadian Travel Agencies, say tourism and the travel industry won’t recover as long as there are still pre-arrival testing laws in place. “The WestJet Group welcomes today’s announcement from the federal government outlining changes to Canada’s border measures and travel policies,” airline officials said. “The WestJet Group will continue to advocate, based on science and data, for the removal of all measures impacting fully-vaccinated air travellers.” “As a fully-vaccinated industry, we have worked with Read more
There’s growing evidence that Canada is open to changing its on-arrival testing program for international air travellers. A prominent tourism and business group yesterday called for on-arrival tests to be scrapped, arguing they’re not necessary and that tests should be redeployed to help make up for test shortages in Canadian communities. Canada’s Chief Public Health Officer, Theresa Tam, said later in the day that the policy will be evaluated “over time.” “It is a capacity drain on the system as a whole,” she said, acknowledging the concerns raised by the Canadian Travel and Tourism Roundtable group. “Tracking every case isn’t Read more
