Passengers walk into the arrival area at Montreal-Trudeau International Airport in Montreal on March 21, 2020.Andrej Ivanov/The Canadian Press
Montreal-Trudeau International Airport will offer rapid COVID-19 nasal swab tests for departing passengers flying to countries where a negative test is a condition of entry in a pilot project intended to help travel to resume.
The eight-week testing effort will begin on Dec. 15 and will be available initially for travellers to big cities in France on Air Canada, Air France, Air Transat and KLM Royal Dutch Airlines.
The tests cost $149 each, administered by Biron Health Group Inc.
France is in a lockdown until Dec. 15, and does not allow Canadians or most other non-European Union nationals to enter. Those who are allowed to enter must provide a medical certificate showing they tested negative within 72 hours of departure.
Anne-Sophie Hamel, a spokeswoman for the airport, said the service is intended as a more seamless alternative to obtaining a test on your own before travelling, or taking a test on arrival in France. There are plans to expand the service for travellers to other countries.
“To get the results it’s about 15 minutes,” Ms. Hamel said from Montreal. “It’s a new service we want to offer passengers because the negative test is required to travel to France. There is a large French community here and we know people are going back home.”
Air Canada, Air Transat and Air France each fly a handful of flights a week to Paris.
Meanwhile, WestJet Airlines said on Monday it is expanding to Ontario a predeparture testing program for customers flying to Hawaii.
WestJet has been offering private-lab COVID-19 tests to passengers from Alberta and B.C. flying to Hawaii, which exempts arriving travellers with negative test results from a two-week quarantine. In Ontario, WestJet customers can take COVID-19 tests with LifeLabs at Shoppers Drug Mart pharmacies for $199.
The airlines and airports say testing is needed to boost travellers’ confidence they will not catch the virus on a plane, and to allow quarantines to be shorter or even eliminated. If a person can be shown to be healthy by testing, they do not need to isolate for 14 days when they arrive at their destination or return home – a massive barrier to travel, the industry says.
“Among all the measures based on a scientific approach put forward by Air Canada in recent months, the screening test at the airport is by far the most important,” Air Canada said in a statement.
Demand for travel has plummeted because of the pandemic. Canada and most other countries have imposed travel restrictions and quarantines for travellers as part of their efforts to slow the spread of the deadly virus, which has killed more than 1.5 million people worldwide, including more than 12,000 in Canada. To combat the pandemic, the Canadian government has issued an advisory against non-essential international travel.
The federal government, airport operators and airlines are partners in COVID-19 testing at airports in Vancouver, Calgary and Toronto. Vancouver is testing some domestic travelers while Toronto and Calgary are offering tests to arriving international passengers. In Alberta, people who test negative after arriving at Calgary airport or the land border crossing at Coutts, Alta., do not have to quarantine for 14 days.
The Toronto project gives passengers three tests: on arrival, after seven days and after 14 days. Preliminary results found 94 per cent of infected people were identified by the second test seven days after arriving, a result the researchers say means tests could be used to shorten Canada’s 14-day travel quarantine.
Peter Fitzpatrick, an Air Canada spokesman, said the carrier’s daily flights to Paris mainly carry customers with dual citizenships, and the tests could help boost the flight frequency as travel resumes and restrictions are eased.
“We have been advocating a science-based approach to safely ease travel restrictions, and testing is a key element of this,” he said. “As the Toronto … study showed, testing is an effective way to screen travellers and offers a safe and effective alternative to lengthy, blanket quarantines and other restrictions.”
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