The federal government is not banning people from travelling out of the country, but increased health precautions are advised.
Health Minister Jean-Yves Duclos says the most recent federal modelling shows increased COVID-19 cases into the new year and they don’t know what effect the omicron variant could have.
‘The new variant tells us that we need to be even more vigilant, when in particular, we think about traveling outside of Canada’, says Duclos.
‘Omicron is not yet prevalent in Canada. It has limited community transmission. That is going to change’
Duclos adds that travel outside of Canada could be delays and a hassle getting back into the country because of the testing that is required.
‘If they think about travelling outside of Canada, omicron should be a red…a big red part of their radar screen. It should be flashing, because things are happening very quickly outside of Canada. And so if they think of traveling, that should be a serious alarm bell’.
Duclos says when they brought in the testing measures at international airports on November 30th, the testing capacity was 11,000 tests a day.
That has increased to 17,000 thousand today and the goal is to conduct 23,000 tests per day.
