It’s official: Canada is set to end pre-departure travel testing for vaccinated travellers and the travel industry is thrilled. “Today’s announcement by the federal government is excellent news for the entire travel and tourism industry,” Air Canada crowed, adding that the much-anticipated move will “provide travellers with more certainty, allowing them to plan their next trip with more confidence and without the worry of incurring additional costs.”
Federal Health Minister Jean-Yves Duclos announced on Thursday that vaccinated travellers will no longer need to show a COVID-19 test to enter Canada beginning April 1.
Incoming tourists will still need to be vaccinated to visit Canada and vaccinated people could also still be subject to random molecular tests when they arrive at Canadian airports.
Unvaccinated Canadians who are returning to the country will still need to isolate and be tested on arrival, and again eight days later.
The change will not apply to cruise ships, Transport Minister Omar Alghabra said. Rather, passengers will need to take a test no more than one day before they board, but they will not need to take a test in order to get off the ship.
All travellers continue to be required to submit their mandatory information in ArriveCAN (free mobile app or website) within 72 hours of boarding their transport into Canada. Travellers who arrive without completing their ArriveCAN submission may have to test on arrival and quarantine for 14 days, regardless of their vaccination status.
The news comes at the tail end of the omicron wave in Canada, as new reported cases of COVID-19 have declined since mid-January, though the World Health Organization says the number of cases internationally has begun to creep up in the Western Pacific region, Africa, and Europe.
“Adjustments to Canada’s border measures are made possible by a number of factors, including Canada’s high vaccination rate, the increasing availability and use of rapid tests to detect infection, decreasing hospitalizations and growing domestic availability of treatments for COVID-19,” said Duclos. “As vaccination levels and healthcare system capacity improve, we will continue to consider further easing of measures at the borders – and when to adjust those measures – to keep the people in Canada safe.”
He noted that while the positivity rate at airports was about 10% in January, it has since fallen to about one percent.
Tourism minister Randy Boissonnault added, “We are confident that, thanks to all that Canadians have done to protect one another, we can now take the next step forward and remove testing requirements for fully vaccinated travellers entering Canada. The economy, workers and tourism business owners will benefit from this next step in opening Canada up once again to the world.”
The change has already been met with celebration from Canadian tourist groups like the Canadian Travel and Tourism Roundtable.
In welcoming the news, Air Canada VP David Rheault said, “People are eager to travel and reconnect with their loved ones, and the end of pre-departure testing Canada now joins other countries around the world in reopening…”
Sunwing similarly commended the move, calling it “a natural step forward (that) will undoubtedly support our industry’s rebound,” adding, “We look forward to brighter days ahead and working closely with the agent community to help make even more customers’ vacation dreams come true under our wing.”
Also flying high is the 115,000-member Canadian Snowbird Association (CSA), which notes that it has been extensively advocating for the removal of mandatory testing requirement for vaccinated Canadian travellers returning home for the past 10 months since the federal government’s own COVID-19 Testing and Screening Expert Advisory Panel recommended the move.
“The elimination of the costly and unnecessary pre-arrival testing requirement for fully vaccinated Canadian travellers has been an advocacy priority of the CSA,” said association president Karen Huestis. “The CSA is pleased that the federal government is finally acting on this recommendation to revise the entry requirements and adopt a science-based approach to testing.”
Richard Vanderlubbe, president of Tripcentral.ca, says eliminating tests will make a big difference for Canadians looking to get away this summer.
“The testing was not only a cost, but also a worry for Canadians returning home. The concern about testing positive and being quarantined abroad weighed heavy on Canadians’ minds contemplating foreign travel,” he said, adding that his Hamilton, Ont.-based agency has already seen a pickup in calls and bookings since Wednesday when media first reported on the change.