Border restrictions to be partially lifted July 5
OTTAWA — Canada said on Monday it would start cautiously lifting border restrictions for fully vaccinated citizens on July 5 but made clear it would be months before U.S. and other foreign travelers could enter the country.
From 11:59 p.m. EDT on July 5, those who have received two doses of a COVID-19 vaccine will no longer have to spend time in quarantine. The move applies to Canadians and permanent residents.
“This is the first phase of our precautionary approach ... at this time we are not opening up our borders any further,” said Intergovernmental Affairs Minister Dominic Leblanc. Ottawa first announced the plan on June 9.
Leblanc told reporters that Ottawa was talking to its domestic and international partners “with the goal of allowing fully vaccinated travelers to enter Canada for non-essential reasons in the months to come.”
Canada and the United States first banned nonessential travel in March 2020 as a part of the effort to fight COVID-19. U.S. land borders with Canada and Mexico will remain closed to nonessential travel until at least July 21, the U.S. Homeland Security Department said on Sunday.
The 30-day extension came after Canada announced its own extension on Friday of the requirements that were set to expire on Monday and have been in place since March 2020 because of the coronavirus pandemic.
The U.S. government held working-group meetings with Canada and Mexico on the travel restrictions last week and plans to hold meetings about every two weeks, U.S. officials told Reuters.
Homeland Security said in a statement it noted “positive developments in recent weeks and is participating with other U.S. agencies in the White House’s expert working groups with Canada and Mexico to identify the conditions under which restrictions may be eased safely and sustainably.”
Some U.S. lawmakers and border communities that have been hit hard by the restrictions have pushed to relax them ahead of the busy summer travel season.
Canada is under pressure from companies and the tourism industry to ease the ban, which was imposed to help contain the spread of the coronavirus and has been renewed on a monthly basis since March 2020. The measures have hit the travel and airline industries, which along with U.S. politicians are insisting Ottawa do much more to open the border.
“We are not insensitive to the desire of many sectors of the economy and Canadians to see more steps but that will happen at the appropriate moment,” Leblanc said.
But Canadian officials said further easing would depend on vaccination rates, the number of new COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations as well as the spread of variants of concern.
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau stood firm, saying last week the border would stay largely shut until 75 per cent of Canadians had received the first of a twodose coronavirus vaccine and 20 per cent had been given both shots.
Only 14.7 per cent of eligible Canadians have had both jabs of a two-dose COVID-19 vaccine as of June 18, according to official data.
In talks between the United States and Canada last week, the U.S. government did not endorse setting a specific threshold to trigger lifting the restrictions, a person briefed on the talks said.
“The inability of the U.S. and Canadian governments to reach an agreement on alleviating border restrictions ... is simply unacceptable,” Democratic Representative Brian Higgins and Republican Representative Bill Huizenga, co-chairs of the Canada-u.s. Interparliamentary Group said on Friday.
The United States is also holding working-group meetings on relaxing travel restrictions with the U.K. and the European Union, but U.S. and airline officials said previously they did not expect the Biden administration to lift the restrictions until around July 4 at the earliest.
From 11:59 p.m. EDT on July 5, those who have received two doses of a COVID-19 vaccine will no longer have to spend time in quarantine. The move applies to Canadians and permanent residents.