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The advice is clear. Canada is urging its residents to avoid “non-essential” travel to China because of the still-spreading new coronavirus. The U.S. government has recommended against any kind of visit to the country until the disease is contained.

But what about a unique group of people with little choice in their travel plans — those deemed inadmissible to Canada and facing deportation to China?

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Their fate gave rise to a novel legal dispute late last week, as Toronto resident Ruepang Cao argued that being removed to China would put him at serious risk of irreparable harm from the “raging epidemic.”

In fact, Canada has already put a temporary halt to deportations to Wuhan and surrounding Hubei province — the new disease’s epicentre — though not elsewhere in China, a Justice Department submission in the case revealed.

But a Federal Court judge rejected Cao’s appeal to delay his removal by two or three months, noting he was not being sent to Wuhan and the outlook for “the vast majority of people” infected by the pathogen is positive.