Badenoch

Bogwoppit

Did they ban connecting flights too? Otherwise it seems a little pointless.

Adam Smith

Indeed. Lack of direct flights may discourage a few travellers, but unless there's an entry ban for anyone who has been in India in the last 15/30/whatever days, the impact will be limited.

On Time Reports

Indeed, how is this exactly going to stop new variants? People that are eligible to come to Canada now are very few so this hiccup wouldn’t deter many people to abandon their sights to coming here. I think there are many international students that are on these flights. They aren't gonna give up their lifelong dreams now just because you have to make a connection and take more covid tests.

When the UK ban happened around Christmas, people just found more creative ways to come to Canada and often at the benefit of foreign carriers.

Adam Smith

The Globe has a more in-depth story on this. An interesting stat:

Health Minister Patty Hajdu says half of the people who are testing positive for COVID-19 after arriving in Canada on an airplane came from India, even though Indian flights accounted for only one-fifth of air traffic.

I'm surprised that flights from India have been 20% of the air traffic to Canada recently.

Although the Globe has quotes from health officials in addition to Alghabra, nothing about any other measures to limiting arrivals from India, such as eliminating some of the categories of people who could enter, enhanced quarantine, etc...

FlyerAl

If other countries are also banning India flights (UK, UAE), then it will make connecting routes to Canada more difficult for them. The CBC report says that 50% of all positive cases tested at the border are from India people.

spartacus81

It was mentioned that travellers originating from India and Pakistan and transiting through another country would need to obtain their 72 hour test result from the location of their flight into Canada. So they couldn't just transit through another country, but would need to enter, get tested, and then leave for Canada. Unless some airports have rapid pcr testing in transit areas.

On Time Reports

From the press release: https://www.canada.ca/en/transport-c...-pakistan.html

Looks like the government is encouraging people to buy two separate tickets to come to Canada. So listening to the press conference, Minister of Public Safety said that you wouldn't be able to go DEL-LHR-YYZ because (1) you would need to enter the UK and (2) cannot just do a airside transfer.

exbayern

Lufthansa is one of the largest carriers of people between India and Canada. What's to stop someone from flying LH 761 to LH 492, and getting tested at FRA? This just seems to be optics to appease non-flyers who think that this does much.

paperwastage

I thought india's still under an intl flight ban, most flights operating are for 'repatriation' reasons?

Most people won't be able to buy a LH flight to europe (since they won't be admissible to europe for visa reasons/transit) or any other (self) connecting flight? For those who can, canada can change their safety guidelines to banning any passenger who has history of being in India within last 14 days (versus just departing from india)

On Time Reports

Maybe MEX will be a new transit point? With AC scheduled to restart service to MEX next month and according to wikipedia, no visas are needed to enter Mexico for Indian citizens with Canadian visas/PR, MEX might be convenient...

paperwastage

http://www.airindia.in/images/pdf/OM...vel-abroad.pdf
https://boi.gov.in/content/advisory-...ted-covid-19-1

persons stranded in india who are desirous to travel abroad is substituted with:
"Only those persons shall be allowed to travel to the destination countries, are citizens of that country; who have green card or Permanent Residency Status or OCI card or any other special status in that country; those who are stranded in close neighbouring countries and permitted to exit through India; Indian nationals who are holding any type of visa of any country (other than visa for tourism purpose) if they hold a visa of that country with a minimum residual validity of one month."

not sure if MEX->Canada counts towarsd the " those who are stranded in close neighbouring countries"

On Time Reports

Interesting so it is like a Australia-lite version of obtaining government approval before being able to travel abroad?

paperwastage

hard to say

i think it's partly a $ thing for AirIndia - you disable all other transit routes (i would say mainly ME3), and only allow "approved" typically nonstop routes to operate

Canada would complain if AirCanada isn't allowed to operate but AirIndia is allowed to, so only AI and AC can operate india-canada flights to maximize revenue. you accomplish this by doing that "Australia-lite" version, can only depart India for another country if you're permitted to enter the other country (cannot go via ME3 or europe)

you could spin it as "safety" too - fewer risks if you do non-stop/direct flights

bambinomartino

The PCR test at the connecting country makes sense and I am pleasantly surprised they put that requirement in.

This may sound bad but I've been wondering for weeks now why flights from India and Pakistan feature so disproportionately on the C-19 flight list. A good half of the flights listed originated from these countries. Quite a few from Middle-Eastern hubs that no doubt carry many (mostly?) flyers from there as well. Not sure how many passengers from there on the European flights, but even without those the pattern is clear.

When YYZ had their on-arrival testing program and YYC had the AB pilot, only around 1% of tests came back positive. This at a time when: 1) case numbers were incredibly high in the US (most of YYC's arrivals), and many other countries were in the middle of a scary second wave; and 2) there were no pre-flight testing requirements to come to Canada.

The numbers released so far by PHAC indicate that around 1.5% of non-essential travellers test positive on arrival since the hotel quarantine started. People who tested negative within 72 hours of departure. At a time when COVID cases worldwide (Feb - March) were down half from the after-Xmas highs, and much, much lower than October - December.

That's almost a 50% increase of the rate at which travellers tested positive, and it makes no sense. It would if it were reversed (higher positive rates at height of pandemic when you didn't have to test negative to get on a plane to Canada). So what gives?

All I can think of is either unreliable testing in certain locales, or straight-up fraud. In which case requiring anyone flying from there to provide a PCR test from a location where they can't buy a negative test as easily makes actual sense.

This is what data-driven commonsense policy should look like but this government was dragged kicking and screaming into doing something that actually makes sense.