As of January 15, certain exemptions announced in December will no longer be available to people travelling to Canada. This includes if you are a citizen or permanent resident of Canada, or a work permit holder, visitor or student entering Canada to resume their regular activities.
The first requirement is to be fully vaccinated, meaning at least 2 doses of any of them following:
- AstraZeneca/COVISHIELD (ChAdOx1-S, Vaxzevria, AZD1222)
- Bharat Biotech (Covaxin, BBV152 A, B, C)
- Janssen/Johnson & Johnson – 1 dose
- Moderna (mRNA-1273)
- Pfizer-BioNTech (Comirnaty, tozinameran, BNT162b2)
- Sinopharm BIBP (BBIBP-CorV)
- Sinovac (CoronaVac, PiCoVacc)
- a combination of at least 2 doses of the above vaccines
If you are a citizen or permanent resident of Canada and have received at least 2 doses of any of the abovementioned vaccines, you can enter Canada.
If you are a temporary resident, such as a foreign worker, student or a visitor, and have received at least 2 doses of any of the abovementioned vaccines, you are likely to be allowed to enter Canada.
Unvaccinated children, youth and adult dependents may accompany a parent, stepparent, guardian, or tutor who qualifies as a fully vaccinated traveller when they enter Canada.
The above guidelines are currently in place as per the recommendations of Public Health of Canada (PHAC), due to the current outbreak of Omicron, which has had far reaching effects and has dwarfed the previous variants in terms of number of active cases and hospitalizations, globally.
Health Canada has also advised that there will also be changes to testing and quarantine exemptions for certain travellers, regardless of citizenship, entering Canada.
Currently all passengers entering Canada, regardless of their status in Canada, are required to have a negative COVID-19 PCR result no more than 48 hours prior to their initial country of departure. Passengers may randomly be selected and asked to undergo a PCR test as soon at the port of entry in Canada. If any of the passengers are found to be COVID positive, they will have to undergo a quarantine period as per Health Canada advisory.
