U.S.-Canada land border restrictions extended for at least another month

TORONTO -- The Canada-U.S. land border restrictions will remain in place one year later as the U.S. Homeland Security announced on Twitter that the restrictions for non-essential travel will not be lifted for at least another month.

To prevent the further spread of COVID-19, and in coordination with our partners in Canada and Mexico, the United States is extending the restrictions on non-essential travel at our land borders through April 21, while ensuring continued flows of essential trade and travel.

— Homeland Security (@DHSgov) March 18, 2021

The announcement comes just days after Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said that reopening the border isn’t an immediate priority.

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As of March 18, 7.55 per cent of Canadians have received at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine. In the United States, 22 per cent of the total population have received at least the first dose of the vaccine.

Initially off to a slow start, Canada’s vaccination effort continues to ramp up, with a total of eight million doses arriving in Canada by end of March.

While COVID-19 didn’t hit Canada as hard as it hit the U.S., variants are taking hold in some provinces with experts in Ontario calling for another lockdown in the province.

Canada has had more than 920,000 confirmed COVID-19 infections to date, with more than 22,500 deaths. The U.S. has had nearly 30 million COVID-19 infections and almost 540,000 deaths.

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