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We are US citizens family of five. Both me and my wife have been vaccinated for covid 19 with pfizer. We can bring proof via our vaccine cards showing both doses. I have three children a 13 year old, a 7 year old, and a six year old.

If we are coming from michigan into canada do my kids need to be vaccinated? Do any of us need proof of negative covid 19? Plan is to travel to Canada to meet family at the end of December of this year.

We do not plan to stay in canada at all. We will visit windsor for about 6-8 hours and return back to Michigan. So there is absolutely no plan to stay any days.

JonH
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2 Answers2

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Children who are travelling with fully vaccinated adults are allowed in but must semi-quarantine.

To be specific:

  • unvaccinated children under 12 years of age who are accompanying a parent, step-parent, guardian or tutor who qualified as a fully vaccinated traveller when they entered Canada. For the next 14 days, the children: must take pre-entry, arrival and Day-8 tests (unless under the age of 5); can’t attend school, camp or daycare; can’t attend large crowded settings, indoors or outdoors, such as an amusement park or sporting event; can’t take buses, subways, trains or other crowded transportation; must follow all the requirements in the children’s handout provided at the border

  • Unvaccinated and partially vaccinated youth 12 to 17 years of age are subject to the 14-day quarantine, and all testing requirements for pre-entry, arrival and Day-8 tests, whether or not they are accompanied by travellers who qualify as a fully vaccinated traveller.

I am pretty sure "the 14-day quarantine" for your 14 year old is not the "avoid crowded stuff" the under-12's have to do but rather the "stay in your room and see no-one" that adults have to do. In other words, everyone over 12 is treated the same. Since you are aiming for end of December, I would suggest getting your 14 year vaccinated. There is time for both doses.

Kate Gregory
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@KateGregory's answer discusses vaccination in detail, but not proof of negative COVID tests. As far as I know, everyone in your group needs (since everyone is older than 5) to show proof of a negative COVID test (PCR) taken within the previous 72 hours (see link)

Required to show a pre-entry molecular test
Required to use ArriveCAN
Required to take an arrival test if selected

There's a lot of grumbling about the negative COVID test requirement, so there's a chance it will be relaxed by late December, but those are the rules right now.

There's more on the nuts and bolts of testing in this answer.

update 8 Dec 2022: pre-entry tests are no longer required for Canadians traveling to the US for < 72 hours (see here), but AFAICT the requirement is still there for US citizens traveling to Canada for a short time.

Ben Bolker
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