Canadian Red Cross to assist in Nunavik’s fight against tuberculosis

The Nunavik Regional Board of Health and Social Services (NRBHSS) has struck a two-year deal with the Canadian Red Cross to assist in the fight against tuberculosis, with health officials saying support from the Quebec government is inadequate. 

As of Feb. 16, the region has recorded 13 active cases this year. In 2025, there were 117 active cases in the region of roughly 14,000 people – a record high in recent history. NRBHSS says that's equivalent to the region having one of the highest rates of tuberculosis in the world. 

Dr. Yassen Tcholakov, NRBHSS’ infectious diseases lead, says local health centres are still struggling with capacity issues such as limited housing, clinical space and staff – challenges he says other parts of Quebec may not have to contend with. 

“The support that we were sometimes able to leverage from other provincial partners was not covering the full breadth of needs for the region,” he said.

For now, Tcholakov says the partnership is more of a monitoring exercise to see what gaps the Red Cross can fill. That could involve the Red Cross helping with the logistics of organizing clinical space when a new outbreak emerges. Last year, the Red Cross launched a pilot project alongside the Nunavut government to support the territory’s tuberculosis response.

The Red Cross support will initially start with communities along the Hudson Bay coast, where NRBHSS says the situation is most dire.

Tcholakov says they’ve made good progress on bringing care closer to communities, with more portable X-ray machines and Inuit health workers. 

Since November, the Inuulitsivik Health Centre (IHC), which provides services to Nunavimmiut on the Hudson Bay coast, has been holding mobile screening clinics, though Tcholakov says they haven’t been able to reach and test everybody – or 90 per cent of the population in each community. 

“We're kind of using the same amount of resources to a large extent that we had four or five years ago to manage an outbreak that's now quadrupled or five times in size,” he said.

NRBHSS has yet to secure additional funding from the Quebec government to execute a tuberculosis action plan presented last year. 

In an email to CBC News, Quebec’s Health Minister Sonia Bélanger says public health officials are continuing to monitor the situation in collaboration with Santé Québec and regional partners  “to ensure [there are] appropriate resources, screening and vaccination efforts”.