LETTERS – Rules around COVID testing for travellers are inconsistent

Mel, I was just reading a news article about Point Roberts and how Canada requires a negative COVID test before someone returns to Canada from there. That’s ridiculous.

My wife and I just returned from spending a month in Nova Scotia. This trip entails two flights to get to Halifax, and two flights home, and three weeks driving through the province eating in restaurants, staying in B&Bs, attending events, etc.

On arrival in Halifax, there was a table where you could receive a voluntary rapid test, which we declined, feeling that a false negative result could jeopardize all the reservations we had made, but we expected to have the option when we returned at YVR.

This was not to be…we arrived and left the airport. There was no sign option of a test, nor was there any warning signs regarding the possibility of possible COVID transmission.

Arriving home in Kamloops, we live in a condo complex, where many of the residents are seniors, so before we started to mingle with our friends, we called Interior Health, asking if there was a possibility of us obtaining a COVID test, explaining our month long travels and our living situation. They asked two questions…are you double vaccinated (yes)and do you have any symptoms (no)?

We were refused any precautionary testing. After four long plane flights and a month of travelling around strangers in a different province, no test was available, yet someone who goes down to their cabin in Roberts Bank would require a test to return home. There sure doesn’t seem to be much consistency in the COVID rules.

BOB ELEY