Conservatives call for border restrictions in face of new COVID-19 variant

Conservative Leader Erin O'Toole has called for the government to immediately strengthen border screening in the face of a highly mutated new variant of COVID-19.

The World Health Organization will meet Friday to discuss variant B.1.1.529, which originated in South Africa.

Several nations around the world have already moved to stop air travel from southern Africa.

O'Toole has called on the Canadian government to issue travel advisories, banning non-essential travel to and from South Africa, Namibia, Zimbabwe, Botswana, Lesotho and Eswatini.

The Conservatives also want to see mandatory screening at all international airports from affected counties, regardless of vaccination status and mandatory quarantine for all travellers from those countries.

The party was critical when the government delayed closing Canada's borders at the outset of the pandemic in 2020, and O'Toole said the government should not delay now.

"With reports of the spread of a new COVID-19 variant, we have a small window of opportunity to act, and we must move now," O'Toole said in a statement Friday morning.

Alberta and Ontario's premiers have also called for all travellers originating from those countries to be banned from Canada until more is known about the variant.

There are no direct flights from South Africa to Canada.

Health Minister Jean-Yves Duclos and Transportation Minister Omar Alghabra are expected to hold a news conference with Canada's chief public health officer Friday afternoon to discuss the new variant.

"We are currently in discussions in monitoring what’s happening and discussions about what measures we can implement," Alghabra told reporters Friday.

Canada currently requires a negative molecular COVID-19 test to enter the country, even for fully vaccinated travellers. As of Tuesday, all travellers will need to have two doses of a WHO-approved vaccine to travel to or within Canada.

Not much is known about the new variant, according to the WHO's COVID-19 technical lead Dr. Maria Van Kerkhove.

"Researchers are getting together to understand where these mutations are, and what that potentially may mean for our diagnostics or therapeutics in our vaccines," she said at a briefing Thursday.

The WHO's team will discern whether the variant should be considered a threat, and therefore a variant of concern.

In question period Friday, Conservative MPs asked government ministers repeatedly about the plan to protect Canadians from a potentially dangerous new variant.

"We’ll not hesitate to take action to protect Canadians," said Associate Minister of Health Carolyn Bennett.