MONTREAL -- Travellers disembarking from planes at Montreal's Trudeau Airport entered into a whole new world of public health restrictions as Canada's new COVID-19 safety measures went into effect on Monday.
The airport's arrivals area has been transformed into a testing clinic to accomodate the new rules, which requires arrivals coming in from outside the country to take a COVID-19 test on site and then quarantine in a designated hotel for three days at their own cost.
On the first day of the new rules, some travelers were confused, with one questioning why they are necessary.
"I'm staying alone at home, so I don't know why it is I have to take a hotel," they said.
Others found themselves waiting for as long as three hours to get through to the government's 1-800 number through which hotel bookings are made.
"It doesn't make sense, because I don't want to stay in the airport for three hours," said one traveller.
A day earlier, some arrivals said they decided to cut their trips short in order to beat the deadline and avoid a costly hotel stay.
One couple told CTV News they cut their stay in the Dominican Republic by about a month in order to avoid the quarantine.
“That's why we're here now," said one woman.
"I mean it does the purpose of discouraging people from travelling altogether, and that's what it has to do,” another traveller told CTV Montreal.
Most incoming travellers will need to get tested for the virus upon arrival and again towards the end of their mandatory 14-day quarantine.
Land travellers will also need to take a test, but they’ll be allowed to quarantine at home.
Travellers arriving at land borders will be given self-swab kits, and testing will be provided on-site at several high-volume border crossings across the country.
They'll need to complete a second test on Day 10 of their self-isolation period.
-- With files from the Canadian Press
