Community-wide TB screening a ‘success,’ says Nunavut chief public health officer

More than 90 per cent of target population in Pangnirtung volunteers for screening; dozens of cases found

Dr. Sean Wachtel, Nunavut’s chief public health officer, says a recent community-wide screening in Pangnirtung was a success. (Photo by Jeff Pelletier)

By Jorge Antunes

Pangnirtung’s multimillion-dollar, 10-week community-wide tuberculosis screening revealed six active and 55 latent cases of the respiratory disease.

Pangnirtung’s hamlet office was used as the site of a 10-week community-wide tuberculosis screening clinic that ended Dec. 2. (Photo by Corey Larocque)

“The operation itself has been a great success based on the number of cases detected,” said Dr. Sean Wachtel, Nunavut’s chief public health officer.

“Which of course reduces the burden of TB disease in the community.”

Wachtel spoke to Nunatsiaq News about the screening on Thursday, a few weeks after returning to his post following a six-month leave of absence.

Tuberculosis is a bacterial infection that can be treated with antibiotics. It can infect any part of the body, most commonly the lungs, and can be spread when a person with infectious TB coughs or sneezes.

It can also live in a person as a latent infection, which means it’s asymptomatic and not contagious.

When it’s an active infection, it can cause symptoms such as coughing, fatigue, chest pain, fever, weight loss or night sweats. Latent infections have the potential to become active infections if not treated.

The Government of Nunavut declared an outbreak in Pangnirtung in November 2021. Health officials have diagnosed a total of 46 people with active TB and 256 people with the latent form of the infection since the beginning of that year, according to updated numbers provided by the Department of Health on Friday.

Wachtel said 1,128 people came forward to the community-wide screening, which amounts to 94 per cent of Health’s target population. The clinic’s final day was Dec. 2.

Data gleaned from the community-wide screening will be used to determine its effectiveness and inform future decision making, Wachtel said.

The total cost was anywhere from $2.5 million to $3.2 million, Wachtel said, adding final costs have not been determined. Nunavut Tunngavik Inc. provided $2.5 million, according to NTI spokesperson Kevin Kablutsiak.

“If there is a shortfall, it will be met by the GN or NTI,” Wachtel said.

The territorial government has declared TB outbreaks in two other Nunavut communities — Pond Inlet and Naujaat.

While the clinic is over, tuberculosis screening continues at the health centre for anyone who thinks they may have been exposed to the disease or is showing symptoms.

Pangnirtung is the fourth community in the past five years to see a community-wide screening, following Whale Cove, Qikiqtarjuaq and Kinngait.

The tuberculosis rate in Canada’s North is about 100 times greater than it is in the general population, according to Dr. Michael Patterson, Nunavut’s former chief public health officer, who spoke to Nunatsiaq News about the community-wide screening in September.

In the North, the rate is about 200 or 300 infections for every 100,000 people. The rate among Canada’s general population is about three per 100,000 people.

The Department of Health carried out the clinic in partnership with NTI, with co-operation from the hamlet.

Additional support was provided by Indigenous Services Canada and the Public Health Agency of Canada.

 — With files from Corey Larocque 

Share This Story

(8) Comments:

  1. Posted by ‘success’ on

    Interesting use of quotation marks LOL

    4
    1
  2. Posted by Screener 1 on

    That’s $2,500 to $3,000 spent to screen each person.
    .
    How much per person to cure the 300 Pangmiut with active or latent TB? And when will that be done?

    1
    1
  3. Posted by Righteous Wrongthinker on

    How could they possibly spend 2.5 – 3.4 million (and not even know how much they spent yet!) screening for TB in a community that size? A couple of public health nurses could have done the same thing, in less time. How many people were working on this? Sounds like a money laundering scheme. I’m not even kidding.

    8
    5
  4. Posted by Righteous Wrongthinker on

    Seriously, a couple of public health nurses would cost around $4000 a month each in salary. Even if you put them at the hotel, that wouldn’t be more than 50,000 for a couple of months (still outrageous, but that’s northern hotels). The lab cost probably isn’t even covered in the project, that would be paid for by health whether it’s part of a screening blitz or just part of the day-to-day at the health centre. Throw in another 20,000 (still outrageous) for some posters and swag, and another 30,000 for some sort of grift, and the project should have cost 150,000 tops. Where did the money go? It needs to be accounted for. Nunatsiaq, get a reporter on this!

    5
    2
    • Posted by New Houses on

      You nailed it!
      Our tax dollars to the federal government.
      They gave our money to NTI.
      NTI gave some of our money to the GN.
      The GN paid NTI people to convince Pang-miut to get tested in exchange for gifts and food bought with our tax money.
      So much waste. Money laundering is one way to describe it.
      No one cured.
      No announced plan for a cure.
      But NTI now has numbers they can use in demanding new houses for everyone in Pang. Because everyone knows that over-crowding in old houses causes TB. So the only cure is…
      New houses for everyone!

  5. Posted by Qavvigarjuk on

    What about screennig all Nunavut communities. People travel all over and overcrowding in homes all over too…

    • Posted by S on

      Thank you, Qavvigarjuk. That’s an excellent idea. Seriously.

      Shame that, as another commenter wrote, the cost per person to screen for TB is nearly $3,000. For the whole population that cost would bump to $100 million. A tidy sum to launder; but doable.

  6. Posted by And the health Center closed on

    Wow wow, I fell off from my chair when I read this article and pang health Center is closed. So sad to know that tax payers money is wasted in millions and really. Get ATIPP request Nunatsiaq news to know where and how this money is funnelled.
    Ok you screened and know how many are affected . But what is use when you closed the health Center with no staff. What a joke of planning by the DM and ADM. .

Comments are closed.