The Ontario government is implementing a new strategy to stop the spread of the latest variants of COVID-19. Premier Doug Ford announced on Friday that the province is installing a six-point plan to curb new cases. Editor's Choice: COVID-19 Tests Will Be Mandatory For All Pearson International Travellers Starting Monday “ We welcome the new measures announced by the federal government today, but we need a stop gap to prevent new cases, including variant cases, from arriving in Ontario until those measures are fully in place. Premier Doug Ford The plan will use multiple strategies including mandatory on-arrival COVID-19 testing of international travellers. This will be implemented in Pearson Airport on Monday and will be extended to land border crossings in the coming weeks. Enhanced screening will also be conducted on all positive COVID-19 tests in Ontario to find known variants. Other steps include maintaining public health measures and strengthening case and contact management. "Lifting of public health and workplace safety measures will not be considered at this time until more information on variant spread is known and overall trends in public health indicators improve," states the release. Enhancing protections for vulnerable populations and leveraging data to help identify known and emerging variants will also be part of this six-point plan. The first cases in Canada of the U.K. variant of COVID-19 were confirmed in the Durham Region last month. However, Ford states that since then 51 more cases have been identified across the province.
