Canada will scrap a border entry program next year that made it easy for thousands of people annually, predominantly Americans, to travel into remote areas of Ontario and Manitoba without having to report to a customs checkpoint.

Starting next September, those people will have to trek to one of those border stations or use one of the yet-to-be-established designated telephone reporting sites when entering Canada.

Through the

Remote Area Border Program (RABC)

, set to end next September, the Canada Border Service agency issued annual permits allowing pre-approved Canadian and U.S. residents to freely cross the border in five remote and sparsely populated areas.

In Ontario, and starting from the east, those areas include Cockburn Island and the Sault Ste. Marie’s upper lock system on the border with Michigan, waterways from Pigeon River all the way to the Lake of the Woods, and the entirety of the Canadian shores on Lake Superior. Also affected is Minnesota’s Northwest Angle area bordering southern Manitoba, which is only accessible by water or by road by driving through about 40 miles of the Canadian province.

The program “historically” attracts about 11,000 members annually, according to CBSA, 90 per cent of whom are Americans.

As reported by the

Ely Echo

in Minnesota, permit holders largely consist of paddlers, fishing guides on both sides of the border and their guests, and U.S. residents who own property in Canada.

The agency said introducing telephone reporting in place of RABC improves border security and “builds on processes already in place across Canada, where travellers are required to report to the CBSA from designated sites every time they enter Canada.

“This process ensures a consistent level of security and expectations of compliance for everyone,” it stated in

a press release.

Telephone reporting for general aviation and private boats entering Canada was introduced around the turn of the century in the

Canada-United States Accord on Our Shared Border

as CANPASS. It was expanded in 2022 with the creation of “telephone reporting site/land” designation, allowing travellers by other “non-commercial conveyances” to enter at designated sites.

According to

CBSA

, at the site, only the person operating the vehicle can exit to report upon arrival, at which time they can use a phone on site or their own device to contact the telephone reporting centre. Not unlike any border crossing, they must then supply all the necessary information for themselves and all passengers — identification, length of stay, reason for travelling, any required declarations, and so on.

“The location of the new telephone reporting sites will be decided in the coming months in consultation with Indigenous communities, local businesses and law enforcement partners,” CBSA stated.

The agency said the measure “will also more closely align with how travellers report to U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP)” in remote areas on their side of the border.

CBP doesn’t appear to employ a specific land-based reporting system, but it does use an app called

Reporting Offsite Arrival – Mobile (ROAM)

, which allows pleasure boaters and other “travellers arriving in remote locations” to report entry into the U.S. via their own device or “a tablet located at local businesses to satisfy reporting requirements.

National Post has contacted both CBSA and CBP for more information about their programs and remote border entry.

CBSA’s decision ends over a year of uncertainty for RBAC permit holders. Last September, Canada put the program on pause, suspending all new applications and renewals, while it underwent a review, as reported by the

Duluth News Tribune.

CBSA later extended existing permits issued after Sept. 1, 2023, until the end of 2025, the

Grand Forks Herald

reported earlier this year. Those were extended again, this time until the program ends officially on Sept. 14, 2026.

Some U.S. politicians have expressed concern about the impending change.

Minnesota Congressman Peter Stauber, in a letter sent to Canadian Public Safety Minister Gary Anandasangaree, outgoing Canadian Ambassador to the U.S. Kirsten Hillman, and CBSA President Erin O’Gorman, said he and his peers were disappointed with the end of RABC, but encouraged by the promise of expanded telephone reporting.

But

the letter

, co-signed by fellow Republicans Jack Bergman, a Michigan congressman, and North Dakota Senator Kevin Cramer, was not without reproach.

“Unfortunately, the nearly two-year review of the RABC program has been marred by uncertainty and retracted statements,” they wrote.

“During this time, the Canadian government has been unable to respond to the questions permit holders have posed.”

The letter also asks Canadian officials to explain how stakeholder needs will be handled during and after the program ends, whether access will be restricted in any way, and seeks clarity on the access rules for current users. It also encourages them to visit the remote communities to “engage with local elected officials, businesses, and property owners” affected by the change.

Donny Sorlie, owner of the Chippewa Inn on the Canadian side of Saganaga Lake, was cautiously optimistic about the changes.

“It very well could be a good thing, as long as they get it figured out,” Sorlie told

Paddle and Portage Magazine

. “Until then, we’re still feeling a bit left in the dark here.”

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A husband and wife travelling from British Columbia to Toronto for the holidays say they were prevented from boarding a Flair Airlines flight when they showed up at the gate with two dogs and their 10-month-old daughter.

Ryan Coulson, an app developer, and Rebecca Bordeiasu, a grade-school teacher, booked their flight on Nov. 3 for a Dec. 12 departure from Abbotsford Airport, near their home in Langley, B.C. Their itinerary, shared with National Post, shows two adult passengers, an infant, and two pets in the cabin.

But they say that when they arrived at the gate for the flight, they were told they couldn’t board the aircraft.

“We were told, without warning, that Flair had implemented a new internal policy on November 20 stating that a passenger cannot fly with both a dog and an infant,” Coulson said in an email to National Post. “We were never notified of this change, and there is no mention of this rule anywhere in Flair’s published policies, domestic tariff, or pet-travel webpage. In fact, Flair’s website still allows passengers to book a flight with both an infant and a dog.”

Bordeiasu joked: “The lady was almost trying to make us choose between our dog and our baby.”

National Post viewed the earlier version of the airline’s pet-travel page, which has

since been amended

and now says: “Each adult may travel with either one infant or one pet. Transport Canada regulations require that if an infant and a pet are travelling together, each must be accompanied by a separate adult.”

A Flair spokesperson confirmed the change, telling National Post: “We updated the wording on our website on December 17 to improve clarity for customers, but the policy itself did not change.”

They added: “The rule in question is longstanding and comes directly from Transport Canada approved manuals for this aircraft type.”

However, a spokesperson at Transport Canada told National Post: “There are no Transport Canada requirements related to passengers travelling with both infants and pets.” They added: “Individual airlines may have policies or restrictions for passengers transporting animals while also travelling with infants. It is therefore recommended that travellers contact their airline well in advance to inquire about their specific situation.”

Tested on Dec. 19, Flair’s website chatbot was asked: “Can I bring an infant and a dog on the flight with me?” It replied: “Yes, you can bring an infant and a dog on the flight with you, but they must meet certain requirements.”

Bordeiasu said that, on Sept. 15, she had made the same flight, minus one dog and her husband, with Flair.

“I did this exact situation, with a dog and an infant,” she said. “I flew alone, I had a dog at my feet, my infant in my lap, with Flair. And it was not a problem. Now this rule has just been added. And personally I think, what’s the point of this rule? It’s clearly not safety because other airlines are allowing it, and they’ve allowed it for so long.”

Those other airlines, she said, include Westjet and Air Canada. Unable to fly with Flair, the couple booked a flight through Air Canada for several days later, and all five passengers — two adults, one infant and two dogs — arrived in Toronto on the same flight.

“They were stellar on the Air Canada flight; no one knew they were there,” said Bordeiasu of her dogs, which are both tiny chihuahua mixes and can be stowed under the seats. “Me and my husband, we each wear a backpack. They’ve got everything they need.”

She is relieved to have made it to her family in Toronto in time for Christmas, and not to have lost much of an extended stay that lasts until Jan. 15.

“This is my daughter’s first Christmas,” she said. “If we’d booked the 23rd of December, I would have been more livid than I am now.”

Gábor Lukács, founder of the organization

Air Passenger Rights

, told National Post: “Sadly, an airline citing a non-existent Transport Canada rule is not unheard of. It appears that the airline had no legal basis to refuse the passengers transportation.”

He added: “The airline should compensate the passengers for their expenses plus the inconvenience experienced. If the airline refuses to pay, the passengers should take the airline to small claims court.”

The couple says Flair offered to reimburse the cost of their flight but did not offer any further compensation, and that they are in touch with a lawyer.

Lukács said his organization is

lobbying the government

to broaden the definition of “denial of boarding” and provide additional rights for passengers in these types of situations.

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Matthew Miller recently had the “very unpleasant experience” of getting infected with influenza A. “Oddly enough, as someone who has spent their whole life studying flu, this was the first time that I know for sure it was a flu infection by virtue of a diagnostic test,” said Miller, who holds a Canada Research Chair in viral pandemics at McMaster University in Hamilton.

Miller got infected two days post-abdominal surgery. “Coughing after having abdominal surgery is no good to begin with. On top of that, I was really non-functional.”

He experienced fever, muscle aches. “I didn’t have energy to do even simple things, like email.”

Because the rapid response test he had could only determine if it was influenza A or B, via nose and throat swabs, Miller doesn’t know for certain that he was hit with the mutated strain of influenza A H3N2 called subclade K, which some have dubbed with the unscientific term “super flu.” But it’s likely, given the proportion of infections caused by that virus, now the dominant strain in a flu season that has hit early and hard.

F
lu activity for the week ending Dec. 13 was “high and increasing,” according to the Public Health Agency of Canada’s
most recent report
. Overall, 27.7 percent of tests were positive, “similar to the highest value recorded in the past three seasons.” (The percentage of tests positive for COVID was stable. Positive tests for RSV — respiratory syncytial virus — were increasing slowly but below expected levels.)
 

Doctors are reporting emergency departments “rammed with flu cases” and the rate of weekly flu-related hospitalizations is increasing rapidly, the federal health agency reported, with the highest rates in adults 65 and older and children aged four and under.
 

Miller is a big believer in balanced messaging. “I think this year has posed some unique challenges,” he said, partly due to an earlier-than-normal start and a mismatch with this year’s flu vaccine.
 

How worrisome is it? The National Post spoke with Miller, scientific director of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research, and 
Dr. Jesse Papenburg, a pediatric infectious diseases specialist at the Montreal Children’s Hospital, to break things down. The interviews have been edited for clarity and brevity.
 

What is so different about subclade K and is it as bad as some people are making it sound?
 

Papenburg: We won’t know for sure until we hit the peak and then we’ll be able to better assess the impact of the season. (He expects the season will peak around New Year’s Day.) But there are a few things that do distinguish this season. It started relatively early and that did mean that there were some people who intended to get vaccinated but just hadn’t been able to get around to it. It’s remarkable that, even though the influenza seasons tend to have a steeple-shaped epidemic curve, this one is very sharp. Rates have been rising quite precipitously these past few weeks. What is also remarkable is how hard the school-age group has been hit in terms of attack rates, or the number of infections. In Quebec and Ontario, school-aged kids have a roughly 60 per cent (test) positivity right now. Overall, at the peak of influenza season, it’s usually somewhere between 25 and 40 per cent.”
 

Miller: Certainly, in Ontario the flu season has been earlier than we often see by about a month or so. In general, H3N2 tends to cause more severe infections. Often in the years where H3N2 is dominant, which appears to be the case this year, we do see more severe cases, more hospitalizations. And those, often, tend to be more common in elderly populations, because they tend to be at high risk for severe illness all the time. There have been a lot of reports of really busy children’s hospitals. Unlike COVID-19, children are at higher risk of flu. Especially children between birth and four years old. They can be at very high risk of severe flu infections.
 

What gives this variant a “transmission fitness advantage”?
 

Miller: The mutations in this particular virus are mutations at sites where our antibodies tend to recognize the virus. When our antibodies (from past infections or vaccines) have a harder time recognizing the virus, the virus has an easier time replicating in our bodies. There’s more of it in our bodies and then, as a result, the more you are able to transmit the virus when you talk or cough or sneeze — all the things that shoot the virus into the air or immobilize it on surfaces, which are the main ways we get infected with flu.

Papenburg: This subclade is substantially different from what it has evolved from. And, unfortunately, there was evolution from the time that the WHO (World Health Organization) had to make recommendations for what strains should be included in the vaccine. The choices need to be made in February to give vaccine manufacturers sufficient time to produce and distribute millions upon millions of vaccine doses to the Northern Hemisphere. (Canadian researchers 
were the first to report
 that a new variant with “immune escape potential” emerged at the tail end of the Southern Hemisphere’s flu season.) For the genetic analyses, we suspected this change would lead to the virus evading not just immunity produced by the vaccine, but it also makes the virus quite different from the H3N2 viruses that have circulated recently. This evolution is partly one of the reasons we see such high levels of transmission.
 

Is it any more virulent? Does it cause the same illness and symptoms?
 

Miller: There’s nothing to suggest that the illness is inherently different. I’m not aware of any data at this point to suggest that the overall severity on the population level is massively different from what we see in other H3N2-dominated years.
 

Papenburg: The proportion requiring hospitalization remains the same. But it’s also a numbers game: Due to the high number of infections, I expect that we’re going to see a lot more hospitalizations to come.
 

Is it still worth getting a flu shot?
 

Papenburg: Absolutely it’s worth it, and it’s not too late. We don’t yet know how well the flu shot will work in the field. We suspect it’s not going to be as good as we’d like. But there is one study out of the UK — they had a very early season so they were able to accrue cases to do a very early analysis — and they reported the vaccine was 60 to 70 per cent effective in children at reducing the risk of emergency department visits or hospitalizations. In adults, it was 30 to 40 per cent effective. My point here is there’s not zero protection. That is for sure. The vaccine does protect. People who are at higher risk of complications, if you reduce your risk by 30 per cent, that’s still a third less chance of something very bad happening to you.”
 

Miller: My colleague Mark Loeb and I published a paper this year where we specifically looked to see whether, in cases where people got a flu shot but got infected anyway, does the shot offer any benefits relative to someone who gets infected and didn’t have the flu shot. We looked at every paper that’s ever been published on this topic and, very reassuringly, it’s extraordinarily consistent: there is a big reduction in what we would consider severe outcomes, things like hospitalizations or ICU admissions or death in cases where people still get infected even after getting the flu shot. Even in years where there is a (vaccine) mismatch, there’s still significant reductions in the severity of illness that happens.
 

How do you know if it’s the flu, COVID or a cold?
 

Miller: Fever is the big thing with flu that people underestimate. As soon as your body temperature elevates even a couple of degrees, it really impacts how well you can function, and that is very different from other common cold-type viral infections that circulate this time of year.
 

Papenburg: The classic symptoms of influenza are sudden onset high fever, usually with a cough. You can have sore throat and muscle aches and fatigue. COVID can also cause that, but there is so much more flu right now than anything else. If you have that influenza-like illness, that constellation of fever, sore throat, cough and fatigue and muscle aches it’s very likely you have the flu.
 

When do people need to seek medical attention?
 

Papenburg: That will vary a bit by age and how vulnerable you are, medically. So, babies during their first three months of life, any fever can be a serious infection, and you should seek medical attention. With older children, we’re looking more at things like fast breathing, difficulty breathing, lethargy, so really low levels of energy, even in between fever bouts, and dehydration — dry mouth, dry lips, decreased urine output and just wilting like a flower that hasn’t been given any water. With older adults, it tends to be complications of underlying medical illnesses they have, so worsening of a heart condition, worsening of an underlying respiratory condition.
 

How it it treated?
 

Papenburg: Most people who get influenza infection don’t need to get tested. If they are otherwise healthy and don’t have any danger signs, most don’t need to be treated. But we do have antivirals that are specific to influenza. When we recommend them to be used, they’re best used early in the disease, the first 48 hours. People who are at very high risk or who are getting progressively worse disease, that might be an indication for antiviral treatment.
 

National Post
 

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When Ontario resident Cindy McKay was preparing for a month in Europe this year, travelling with her 12-year-old grandson and living out of the contents of two carry-on bags, she knew she had homework to do.

“British Airways, Ryanair, Scandinavian,” she says, ticking off the various airlines that would take them to Athens, Crete, Dubrovnik, Prague, London and back to Canada.

Her plan? “Make a spreadsheet of all of the different airlines, what their requirements are, their weight allowances, their centimetres, all of it for me and my grandson to not get, you know, buggered anywhere on any flight.”

McKay knew not only that airlines have various restrictions on luggage size and weight, but that these are lines in the sand. And sand has a way of shifting.

Just ask an authority.

“It does seem to have decreased,” says Jim Bookbinder, who teaches transportation and logistics as a professor of management science at the University of Waterloo. “The size allowed, that has decreased over the years.”

He adds, with a touch of professorial modesty: “Not that I’m an expert in this, but I fly like everybody else.”

A

BBC report

found that maximum carry-on sizes had decreased by as much as 55 per cent since 2018, with European budget airlines being some of the biggest agents of change.

For instance, the British airline easyJet, which used to allow free hand luggage of up to 56 by 45 by 25 centimetres, has cut back to 45 by 36 by 20, shaving at least five centimetres off each of the three dimensions. Budapest-based Wizz Air made a similar move, going from 55/40/23 down to 40/30/20.

Bucking the trend just a little last year was Calgary-based WestJet, which modified its carry-on limits from 56/36/23 to 53/38/23, an increase of a modest 2.2 per cent that aligned it with some airlines, but also differed from others.

“There’s a move afoot to have a standard size for all flights within the European Union,” Bookbinder reports. “But I don’t think that’s quite passed yet. That measure has been proposed but is still under discussion.”

In any case, the name that keeps coming up is Ryanair, the Dublin-based ultra-budget airline that flies across Europe. Carry-on baggage on those flights went from 55/40/20 in 2018 to just 40/25/20 last year. That’s the 55 per cent drop. Any larger and you’ll pay a fee.

Bookbinder calls Ryanair “the worst offender, as we would define the offence of trying to keep passengers from having a carry-on bag that’s viewed as too large.”

But he adds that fees matter to the industry, particularly at the budget end of the spectrum. “Up to 30 per cent of the discount airlines’ revenue is from these extra fees.”

People will pay to keep their bags in the cabin with them, and to not have to wait at the carousel when they land. “The airline that charges for that privilege of being able to get on your way right away, I guess they found a point of vulnerability on the part of some passengers.”

Air Canada joined that club this year. While their carry-on size has remained the same for many years, it has stopped allowing free carry-on luggage at the lowest economy tier.

And even though the airline plans to expand its fleet next year with the latest Airbus 220 aircraft (featuring extra overhead bin space), it has no plans to undo its fee-for-bags rule.

Bookbinder says the trend for airlines to squeeze more passengers into existing space also reduces the overhead bin space per customer.

“They reconfigure the aircraft from time to time, and if you add a couple of more rows of seats … the volume available to each could be slightly less.”

He prefers to check his own baggage. “And the reason is I worry about getting into a fight with another passenger over the last overhead bin.”

McKay, on the other hand, prefers to run the numbers and make them work for her.

For instance, a British Airways carry-on can’t be larger than 56 by 45 by 25 centimetres, including wheels and handle, and it has to weigh less than 23 kilograms.

But transfer to Scandinavian and your limits are a few vital centimetres less, at 55 by 40 by 23, with a weight limit of just eight kilos.

At Air Canada, the size limits are the same, but there’s no upper limit on weight as long as you can pick it up. (Fun fact: You can stuff 57 kilos of lead, or almost 100 kilos of gold, in an Air Canada regulation carry-on.)

Armed with the data, McKay went to the Costco website and bought a bag by Bugatti, “which sounds super fancy but it was $99.” Costco delivered it to her door in Ontario’s Muskoka region, where she works remotely in the real estate appraisal industry.

“So it worked. And my new luggage, which I absolutely love, has a compartment right on the front of it for your laptop. So you don’t have to dig inside your luggage to get at it.”

(New scanners

at most Canadian airports

mean you no longer have to take your laptop out of your carry-on when you go through security, but smaller airports still have older technology.)

Suitcase manufacturers do what they can to keep up with changing (and shrinking) carry-on sizes, but it really is a case of buyer beware.

Kaitlyn Coleman, public relation and communications director at New York-based luggage maker Away, says her company offers the Carry-On and the slightly larger Bigger Carry-On.

“We don’t have plans to make adjustments at this time,” she adds, but notes that

the Away website

, like those of many suitcase manufacturers, has a list of airlines and their size requirements.

Briggs & Riley similarly produces two different standard size carry-ons “that are compliant with most carry-on baggage allowances for domestic and international flights,” says Jason Russo, an account supervisor. The company also produces the Cabin Spinner and the Underseat Duffle, designed for under-the-seat storage.

“They do not have any plans to change the dimensions of their carry-on pieces as these sizes ensure that luggage will meet the most amount of requirements put forth by various airlines,” he says.

Bookbinder notes: “For carry-on luggage, your best bet is a soft-sided bag, which you can squeeze a little bit to fit in.”

McKay says it’s all about doing your homework. Oh, and to be safe, never use those “does-it-fit” devices at the gate.

“Yeah, I never put them in there. I just breeze on through with all the confidence in the world that I’m gonna fit.”

Here are the size requirements for carry-on luggage on major Canadian airlines, in centimetres. Note that all but Westjet have the same limits for carry-on luggage, while the personal item sizes vary.

Air Canada:

Carry-on: 23/40/55. Personal article: 16/33/43.

Westjet:

Carry-on: 23/36/56. Personal item: 14/14/33.

Air Transat:

Carry-on: 23/40/55. Personal item: 13/31/43.

Porter:

Carry-on: 23/40/55. Personal item: 16/33/43.

Flair:

Carry-on: 23/40/55. Personal item: 15/33/43.

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