Canada & U.S. Ease Border-Crossing Restrictions With Full Re-Opening Expected Soon

Canada and the U.S. began to loosen pandemic border-crossing restrictions on Monday. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said he plans to completely reopen the border soon.

Since March 2020, Canadian citizens and permanent residents have been asked to complete a 14-day quarantine when traveling between the two countries. Those restrictions have now been lifted for fully vaccinated travelers.

Additionally, air travelers will no longer need to stay at a government-approved hotel for the first three days in the country.

Still, restrictions barring non-essential travel (like tourism) will remain in place until the end of July.

Trudeau asserted that the countries are making a “big step” towards opening up their borders again. “We’re very hopeful that we’re going to see new steps on reopening announced in the coming weeks,” he said. “We’re going to make sure that we’re not seeing a resurgence of COVID-19 cases because nobody wants to go back to further restrictions, after having done so much and sacrificed so much to get to this point.”

Trudeau also noted that the pandemic still poses a real threat to travelers and “things aren’t normal yet.”

“Nobody wants us to move too fast and have to reimpose restrictions as case numbers rise like we’re seeing elsewhere in the world,” he said. “We need to do this right.”

Article by Elizabeth Letsou