Apologies and promises are not enough to end TB in the North – IRPP

May 10, 2022

To finally end tuberculosis in Indigenous communities, the federal government needs to take lessons from the Global South and make a major investment.

In the midst of a raging global pandemic, it is easy to forget that tuberculosis (TB) is the second leading infectious killer after COVID-18 and that ending the TB epidemic by 2030 is among the health targets of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). In Canada, TB still exists in Indigenous communities, though the rest of the country has been free from it for at least five decades.

In 2018, the federal government committed to eliminating TB from Inuit Nunangat – an area that stretches across the Northwest Territories, Nunavut, northern Quebec and part of Labrador – by 2030. In 2019, the government offered an official apology to the Inuit community for mismanaging the tuberculosis epidemic from the 1940s to the 1960s. To meet the SDG goal and Canada’s commitment to end the TB pandemic by 2030, Canada needs to invest resources to showcase a genuine desire to overcome decades of oppression and failures in the treatment of Indigenous communities.

Read More: https://policyoptions.irpp.org/magazines/may-2022/tuberculosis-indigenous-canada/