PM says a national contact tracing app is coming next month, how will it work?

OTTAWA -- The federal government will begin testing a “completely voluntary” mobile contact tracing app in Ontario, to eventually be used nationwide, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said on Thursday. The app will compile confirmed positive COVID-19 cases and notify Canadians when they’ve been in proximity to someone who has the virus. The government intends to make the free app available for download in early July and said that the program will be compatible with 30 million smartphones in Canada, meaning a significant portion of the population could use the app and be notified directly if they’ve come into contact with anyone who has tested positive for COVID-19 in the last 14 days.

Trudeau described the app as one that people can download and forget about, though it is set to face scrutiny over the fine print of its privacy and permissions settings, as Privacy Commissioner Daniel Therrien says he’s yet to offer his recommendations about the app to the government. In making the announcement the prime minister said the case monitoring and exposure notification application a “crucial” public health step as more Canadians begin resuming some semblance of normal life, including returning to work.

“I want to stress that this will be completely voluntary. It will be up to individual Canadians to decide whether to download the app or not. But the app will be most effective when as many people as possible have it,” Trudeau said. Ontario Premier Doug Ford said Thursday afternoon that the app will be part of the province’s overall tracing strategy. “If we can trace, we can track it,” Ford said, adding that his government will have more to say in the coming days about the “madein-Ontario” app.

Health authorities in Ontario will be the first to distribute the unique codes to people who test positive for COVID-19.