Nunavik Tuberculosis Rates 1000 Times Higher Than Non-Foreign-Born Quebeckers

Based on coverage from News-Medical, EurekAlert!, Mirage News, CMAJ, Scienmag, and News Directory 3.

Tuberculosis is surging in Nunavik, northern Quebec, and new research and local health data point to the same uncomfortable reality: Inuit communities are carrying a disease burden that looks nothing like the rest of the province, while the health system struggles to keep up.

A study published April 6 in the Canadian Medical Association Journal (CMAJ) says TB rates for Inuit in Nunavik are about 1,000 times higher than among non-foreign-born Quebeckers. The researchers also argue the day-to-day design of TB care, shaped by chronic under-resourcing, can add to the hardship people face while trying to get diagnosed and treated.

Nunavik tuberculosis rates far above Quebec

The CMAJ paper describes a rising TB incidence in Nunavik since 2003, with sharper increases over the last decade and record numbers reported in 2023, 2024, and 2025.

Separate reporting citing Nunavik’s regional health authority puts recent case counts in stark terms: Nunavik had 103 TB cases by Nov. 21, 2025, surpassing 94 cases in 2024. By Dec. 10, 2025, that figure had risen to 112 active cases. Jessika Huard, identified as the tuberculosis elimination program manager at the Nunavik Regional Board of Health and Social Services (NRBHSS), said it was the highest reported level in recent history and among the highest TB rates in the world.

That same reporting says seven communities were experiencing outbreaks as of November 2025, though NRBHSS declined to name them, citing privacy concerns.

CMAJ study centres Inuit experiences

Rather than focusing only on case numbers, the CMAJ study set out to document what TB care actually feels like for Nunavimmiut. The project was conducted in partnership with Nunavik Inuit and led by a predominantly Indigenous research team.

Researchers interviewed 156 Nunavimmiut (61% women; 37% under 35) in five Nunavik communities and in Montréal, plus 21 non-Inuit health care workers. A substantial number of interviews were done in Inuktitut, reflecting the fact that more than 95% of Nunavimmiut speak it.

Participants described a strong desire to protect their own health and their community’s health, and a clear preference for Inuit control over TB eradication strategies, including control over services and data.

How under-resourced TB care adds hardship

A key finding is that TB care itself can become a source of hardship when services are built around system constraints rather than people’s lives.

The CMAJ study describes patients having to leave their home community for parts of care, including travel to Kuujjuaq or Puvirnituq for chest X-rays or inpatient isolation, because radiography is routinely available at the two hospitals and only intermittently in four other communities. Samples may also be processed outside Nunavik, with smears and cultures done in Montréal.

Interviewees also raised concerns about limited Inuktitut-language care, long periods of isolation during treatment, and anxiety tied to information gaps about TB in their community. The paper says anyone diagnosed with active TB in Nunavik must sign a contract acknowledging treatment is mandatory under Quebec law and that court or police intervention may be used to enforce testing and treatment, a measure participants said can feel coercive.

Health care workers interviewed in the study echoed many of these concerns.

Seven Inuit Calls to Action on TB

The study groups Inuit recommendations into seven “Calls to Action”:

- Increase Inuit control over services and data - Provide person-centred care - Increase local services to minimize displacement - Use community-wide screening adapted to local needs - Train and hire more Inuit health care workers - Reduce stigma - Implement Inuit-led cultural safety training for health care workers

The authors say Quebec and Canada need to respond urgently by addressing chronic under-resourcing so Nunavik can implement a more supportive approach aligned with what Nunavimmiut are asking for.

A related CMAJ commentary by Dr. Pamela Orr at the University of Manitoba argues that when non-Indigenous researchers work with Indigenous partners, they have a duty to move beyond acknowledgement toward action, and she frames this work as an example of that approach.

Screening efforts and the funding squeeze

On the ground, Nunavik health organizations are already making changes the CMAJ paper says better align with Inuit preferences, including more regular sharing of TB statistics with local leaders, hiring community members into public health roles, and launching training for health care workers that covers TB history in Nunavik and cultural safety.

Local reporting also describes mass screening as one tool being deployed. The Inuulitsivik Health Centre launched a mobile-clinic screening program in Inukjuak from Nov. 3 to Nov. 28, 2025, with the goal of using it as a model for other communities.

Still, officials have also been blunt about the limits. That reporting says NRBHSS had presented a TB action plan earlier in 2025 but had not secured additional Quebec funding by December 2025, and Huard warned the health system cannot solve the crisis alone, pointing to housing, infrastructure, and other social services as part of what drives transmission and what it will take to bring TB down.

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