Almost One in Four Arriving Passengers Have Been Exempted From Quarantine Hotel Program
April 1, 2021 ctn_admin
Almost one quarter of all air travellers arriving in Canada since the Trudeau government began its quarantine hotel plan have been exempted from the controversial program.
The National Post reports that in the month since the order was put in place on Feb. 21, roughly 26,000 travellers coming into Canada by air were exempt from the mandatory hotel stays, which can cost upwards of $2,000 and have been the target of vociferous complaints. Those 26,000 travellers represent some 23% of all air travellers in that one-month period, the paper said, quoting from numbers provided by the Public Health Agency of Canada.
“That means those travellers, unlike everyone else, didn’t have to show proof of a pre-booked and fully paid stay at one of the approved hotels near the airports in the four cities in Canada allowed to accept international flights: Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver and Calgary,” the paper said.
The Post also noted that in that one-month period following the start of the quarantine hotel program, police agencies have issued 100 tickets to arriving travellers for refusing to go to a quarantine hotel
Some travellers have been hit with fines of $3,800.
The government of Canada website says essential workers, airline employees and select others are not required to follow the hotel quarantine program.
PHAC officials also told the Post that, of the 94,135 COVID-19 tests done on all arriving travellers to Canada, both air and land, in the month since quarantine hotel restrictions were put in place, 1,213 tested positive for COVID-19. That’s a positivity rate of just 1.3%.
The current emergency quarantine order is set to expire April 21. But it could, of course, be extended. Given recent variant numbers in Ontario, B.C. and Quebec, it wouldn’t be the least bit surprising if an extension was announced relatively soon.
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