Suggestions by the prime minister that the Canada-US border may re-open to (vaccinated) American travellers in mid August, and other international visitors by early September, is welcome news to many – especially in the travel and tourism sector. But the fact is, almost three-quarters of Canadians believe that three-quarters of the population should be fully vaccinated before letting Americans in.
According to a July 9-13 survey of over 2,000 people by the non-profit Angus Reid Institute (ARI) – released Thursday, the same day as Justin Trudeau’s announcement – 69% of Canadians say they think the government should wait until at least 75% of Canadians are fully vaccinated before lifting restrictions on non-essential travel that have been in place since March 2020.
Tellingly, a plurality (38%) of survey respondents said they would wait even longer – until more than 75% of Canadians have been fully vaccinated – before allowing US visitors.
The research concluded that as “Canadians begin to re-imagine a post pandemic life, caution and concern remain a significant part of their psyches, especially when it comes to issues of unsealing the land border this country shares with the United States.”
Such sentiment has often been lost amidst the increasingly vocal lobby by the Travel &Tourism sector (notably coalesced under the banner of the Canadian Travel and Tourism Roundtable), along with affiliated business interests, and pressure from politicians both in this country and abroad.
The Trudeau government has previously floated the 75% threshold (though it is unclear whether that includes children under 12 who are not eligible to be inoculated), and indeed, if current vaccination rates in Canada continue, it will be met by the PM’s more specific mid-August timeline: As of Saturday, independent COVID-19 Tracker Canada was reporting that 55% of Canadians 12 and over (and 48%-plus of the general population) had been double-vaccinated. These numbers are currently increasing by approximately a percent per day.
Such metrics are unlikely to alter current border restrictions, which are due to expire Wednesday (July 21), but likely to be renewed for another month as soon as today (July 19).
Notably, though Canada has finally opened the door to a land border re-opening in August, the US has not officially reciprocated the sentiment (though experts expect that important detail to come perhaps as early as today – along with further details on how Canada would implement the move, including required documentation from citizens of a country that has ruled out the use of so-called vaccine passports).
In any case, an almost open border can’t come soon enough for nearly a third of Canadians (30%), who, according to the ARI survey, say that the government is taking too much time and should have already made the move (including 8% who said the threshold should have been at the 50% double vaccination threshold). This group is led by people who travelled frequently before the pandemic, noted ARI, prompting the conclusion that Canadians who don’t travel often aren’t as eager to have an open border during a pandemic.
As for the timing of the government’s decision to drop quarantine requirements for fully vaccinated Canadians returning home from abroad as of July 5, slightly more than half (54%) say that the change was well-timed. Close to equal numbers take opposite positions, however, with one-fifth saying Ottawa waited too long to implement the change (21%), and one-quarter saying the decision was too rushed (25%).
More key findings of the ARI report included:
• Half of Canadians (50%) now say Prime Minister Trudeau has done a good job of handling the pandemic; this is the highest mark since January. 46% say he has done a poor job.
• Personal concern over becoming ill with COVID-19 has dropped to 47%. This is the lowest level since June 2020.
• Canadians overwhelmingly feel that the worst of the negative health impacts from the pandemic have passed; just 12% disagree. A much larger group, 28%, say that the worst economic effects are still ahead, though 72% feel the worst of this has passed as well.
At the same time, rapidly rising COVID rates in the US – based on the highly transmissible delta variant – may upend the government’s best-laid border plans and could harden the resolve of a seemingly reluctant Canadian population to ease restrictions that have already been endured for over 16 months at a point when, as US congressman Brian Higgins of Buffalo says, “It’s the beginning of the end of border restrictions.”
Moreover, with an election looming – or perhaps already under way by August – one can be sure that the government will continue to heed the wishes of a vast majority of the electorate.