That means that a check-in agent, whose previous training was in determining allowable baggage limits, now, with understandably no expertise or experience in the matter, has to evaluate whatever documents passengers produce. If you are in Toronto and you have a standard Ontario Health COVID test, that would be easy enough. But you are not supposed to have that standard Ontario Health result because the public health system is not supposed to do COVID tests for travel purposes. So the airline agent will likely be confronted with a document from a private lab, each one with its own format.
On the other end, the customs and border official in, say, Lisbon, is supposed to monitor vaccination status. Is she familiar with documents issued by the health system in Nova Scotia, or an Indigenous reserve in British Columbia? What about a Walgreen’s vaccine record from Colorado? So unless the passenger himself reveals a lack of vaccination, whatever document is produced is waved through. And if whatever document is waved through, why require it in the first place?
On the return it is even more absurd. Canada requires a negative COVID test for entry, and is particular about which kind. PCR is is the favoured flavour, not antigen. That means another airline agent must determine — in English or French, no matter if his first language is Polish or German — whether the right result was obtained at the right time with the right kind of test. Numerous acquaintances confirm what one would expect: everyone is waved through.
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