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Members of Congress urge Canadian politicians to drop border testing

by Rex Daniel

A day after the US government reopened land borders to vaccinated visitors on Monday, several members of Congress wrote a letter to two of Canada’s top ministers calling for the dissolution of the country’s pandemic testing rule for travelers.

The letter, signed by four Congressional Republicans – including U.S. Representatives Elise Stefanik and Chris Jacobs from New York – echoed concerns raised the day before by mayors of several Canadian and U.S. border communities, as well as U.S. Democratic Representative Brian Higgins, that Canada’s testing rule unnecessarily delays the return to normal at the northern border.

“We believe that this additional requirement to produce a negative COVID-19 molecular test to enter Canada creates unnecessary confusion and may hamper all the benefits of the recent reopening of the US border,” the letter said.

Canada requires anyone entering by land or air to present a negative test result within 72 hours of arriving at the border, regardless of citizenship or immunization status. In contrast, the United States requires testing for air travelers, but not for those crossing the border by car, train, or bus.

While Canada’s rules for crossing land borders are stricter than those imposed by the United States, requiring not only a negative test but also proof of vaccination submitted in advance through their ArriveCAN app, the country has opened its borders. land to American tourists several months earlier: August 2. 9, Americans vaccinated were already eligible to make the trip. Travelers of other nationalities were allowed to enter Canada from September.

Members of the United States Congress and signatories have recognized that the gap in their letter, saying they were “aware of the hardship placed on communities” as a result of the Biden administration’s decision to delay the reopening, and “grateful for the leadership” of Canada on the issue.

In their individual statements, Stefanik and Jacobs noted that the ability to cross the northern border as freely as possible was crucial for voters in border regions of New York, whose lives and economy are closely tied to those of their Canadian counterparts. .

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