December 01, (THEWILL) – The Canadian government has added Nigeria, Egypt and Malawi, to its list of countries placed on ‘travel ban’ over growing concerns of the Omicron variant of COVID-19
“We are adding three countries to the list of these countries that we talked about last Friday, these are Malawi, Egypt and Nigeria”, Canadian Health Minister Jean-Yves Duclos said.
Duclos added that all travellers coming from outside Canada, apart from the United States, would now be tested at Canadian airports for the novel coronavirus disease, regardless of vaccination status.
This came after the World Health Organization on Tuesday called for countries to keep calm and take “rational” measures in response to the new COVID variant, Omicron.
“We call on all member states to take rational, proportional risk-reduction measures,” WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in a briefing to countries, Al Jazeera reports.
Meanwhile, The Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) on Wednesday said it has detected the first case of the Omicron variant in the country.
The Centre in a Press statement issued by its Director-General, Dr Ifedayo Adetifa, linked the cases to two passengers from South Africa.
