Canada to Remove Pre-Arrival Covid-19 Testing for Fully Vaccinated

Canada’s federal government is reportedly close to removing the mandatory PCR testing requirement for fully vaccinated travelers.

Multiple news reports over the weekend, including one from CBC, said that Canada is on the verge of announcing the change, allowing vaccinated Canadians who travel outside of the country to return without having to get a PCR test taken within 72 hours prior to departure.

According to Health Minister Jean Yves-Duclos, who spoke on Friday, the change could be announced sometime this week.

Major voices in the Canadian travel industry have long pushed for a relaxation of pre-travel and post-arrival rules, including the Tourism Industry Association of Canada, which helped a press conference at Toronto Pearson on Thursday.

Officials at that news conference, which featured two infectious disease physicians, argued that the spread of Omicron has made travel-testing requirements pointless and that money spent on those tests, and random tests upon arrival, is a wasted expense.

Travel associations and groups in the U.S. have continued to push for the removal of the testing requirement, something they say is in the way of the industry’s full recovery, both with inbound and outbound travel. According to those groups, international travel is still down 38% compared to 2019, and that testing requirement is responsible for a lot of that gap.

Source: Travelweek