Ottawa needs to say goodbye to ArriveCAN

By Lethbridge Herald on August 27, 2022.

LEAVE IT TO BEEBER
Al Beeber
Lethbridge Herald

Since it was launched in February of last year, the federal government’s ArriveCAN app has been a huge source of contention among Canadians.

I’ve talked to seniors who had problems trying to input their vaccination information into it or add the correct departure and arrival dates. I know people who have been forced to quarantine because they failed to follow instructions properly. And the government has acknowledged an issue with the app that wrongly told thousands of travellers they needed to quarantine when they actually didn’t.

While my own experience was far smoother when I first utilized ArriveCAN last fall, a second trip to the U.S. recently proved to be a bit of an annoyance.

I had saved all my data for future trips. But when I entered my name and password to the app the night before heading to Montana, everything was missing. And I mean everything – including vaccination data and my passport information itself. I swear it was all there when I’d checked it a few weeks ago.

While it only took a few minutes to re-input everything I really wondered why we should have to bother anymore.

Why isn’t it just acceptable for Canadians or foreign travellers to show proof of vaccination at the border if asked by a customs officer? When we head south, the officers at Coutts just ask if you’re double vaccinated. Nobody has asked for proof the two times I’ve gone across since the border reopened to fully vaccinated travellers. Their process is simple, quick and seamless.

But with Canada, we have to go through the rigamarole of filling in ArriveCAN in advance, making sure we put in the data at the right time. For U.S. bound Canadians intending to stay for a week or longer, plugging return dates with enough advance notice can be a hassle as I’ve heard. It would be easy for anyone of any age to get distracted by enjoying a holiday and suddenly realizing they didn’t fill out the ArriveCAN information soon enough. Or perhaps did it too soon.

I’m a strong believer in masking and would wear one without hesitation if mandates were again introduced. I believe in the efficacy of vaccines and I’m completely pro-vaccination. But I also believe it’s time for Ottawa to drop ArriveCAN.

Friends who have been triple vaccinated have caught COVID-19 despite their best efforts to take care of their health. A few have even caught it multiple times despite being vaccinated.  So clearly, even more shots than the mandatory two aren’t necessarily going to protect us from contracting COVID. 

I do believe, from what  I’ve been told by others who have dealt with COVID several times, the effects are definitely lessened with vaccinations. This is common among my friends and from what I’ve read at multiple sources. So yes, vaccinations do help enormously. But as new variants emerge they aren’t going to provide 100 per cent protection. And the ArriveCAN app won’t help either.

Ottawa, by continuing to validate ArriveCAN, is failing to improve the ability of Canadians and tourists to cross the border. Is it really helping to protect Canadians from COVID? Or are mandates doing that? 

ArriveCAN was introduced to screen travellers at land and air crossings for COVID-19 and to keep track of their vaccination status.

Multiple sources have also reported that it is considered by many to be a deterrent to Americans coming to Canada to visit, shop and contribute to the Canadian economy. 

While I’m all for safety, with inflation and the impact of COVID on the Canadian and American economies, I’m also all for making it easier for vaccinated residents to cross the border to shop, explore or to simply visit family members. 

While COVID has perhaps forever changed the definition of “normal,” the ArriveCAN app isn’t going to help things return to the pre-pandemic past. When people who have been vaccinated multiple times are getting COVID multiple times, it’s apparent that this illness is here to stay and we are going to have to adapt to it. I never thought I’d write it but after more than two years of living in the era of COVID, it’s become obvious this plague is here to stay. 

And there isn’t a thing we can do about it. We can lessen the impact of COVID but we can’t completely protect ourselves from acquiring it. And there’s no app for that, including ArriveCAN which is simply another annoyance in the COVID war which we can really do without. 

The Americans don’t have it and while some red states certainly are anti-mask, the U.S. does seem to have a better concept of how to increase tourism and ease the flow of cross-border traffic without any apparent risk to the health of their residents.

As an alternative to ArriveCAN, it would be simpler  for visitors to simply show proof of vaccination when they arrive back at a Canadian border crossing.

I’m tech savvy but I see no need for the inconvenience of re-inputting my passport and vaccination data into an app since I carry both with me when I cross a border.

As they say on NFL Countdown, I would say to Prime Minister Trudeau “C’mon Man!” Time to let it go.