Nunavik launches contest to raise TB awareness

Ahead of World Tuberculosis Day on Sunday, health experts in Nunavik are launching a drawing contest for children to raise awareness of how to fight the illness.

The Nunavik Regional Board of Health and Social Services and the Kativik School Board invited youth in Nunavik communities to help illustrate a 2025 calendar under the theme “My TB-free community,” said Emma Archambault, a spokesperson with the health board, in an announcement earlier this week.

Children are encouraged to draw their own representation of a community that’s free from tuberculosis or a depiction of the fight against the disease. Fourteen drawings will be selected to illustrate the cover of the calendar, the 12 months of the year in 2025, and the first page of the 2026 calendar, Archambault said. 

“World Tuberculosis Day is a reminder that the battle against this disease is still ongoing. It is also a time to illustrate the many health inequities that persist between the populations of southern Quebec and Nunavik, where rates of this preventable disease are over a hundred times higher,” she said. 

There have been 13 cases of TB in Nunavik so far this year, according to Kathleen Poulin, a spokesperson with Nunavik’s health board. 

Six communities are currently experiencing active outbreaks. That’s down slightly from January when eight communities had active outbreaks.

However, “screening operations are currently being planned and during those screenings we usually identify many more cases,” Poulin said.  

There were a total of 79 cases of TB in the region in 2023. This number was revised from the initial report of 81 after further testing, Poulin said. That brought the total incidence to about 500 cases per 100,000 people, more than 100 times that of the rest of the province and “the highest it has been in recent years,” Poulin said. 

The federal government committed in 2018 to work with Inuit towards a goal of eliminating tuberculosis across Inuit Nunangat by 2030, and halve rates by 2025.

Rates of TB in Nunavik are likely to stay high until some core determinants of health are addressed, such as improving housing situations and improving access to care, Poulin said.

TB spreads among people through the air but usually only infects those who have prolonged and repeated contact, such as in overcrowded living situations. Symptoms are often an unusual and persistent cough that lasts for two weeks or more, fever, weakness and tiredness, a loss of appetite, weight loss, night sweats, chest pain when breathing and even coughing up blood. 

However, when TB is caught and treated early, it has little impact on the body and reduces the risk of spreading to other people, Poulin said. 

Health centres conduct investigations for every case of TB and notify close contacts in order for them to undergo the proper screening and get care if it is required. 

Poulin said the Nunavik health board has plans to continue its screening and prevention activities in numerous communities and is exploring new tools for diagnosing and treating tuberculosis. 

To mark World Tuberculosis Day and to raise awareness of the illness, the health board is also launching an online quiz on its Facebook page and website where participants can earn prizes as they learn more about TB, like how it is transmitted, what the symptoms are and what treatments are available. 

TB remains a concern in Nunavut as well, with active outbreaks persisting in Pangnirtung, Pond Inlet and Naujaat. As of March 22, there were 11 active cases across these three communities, said Nadine Purdy, a spokesperson for the Department of Health.

The department anticipates an increase in TB numbers in the territory screening ramps up this year, she said.

The Department of Health hosted a community-wide TB screening clinic in Pangnirtung last fall.

In January, a team of researchers also launched a new five-year study in Iqaluit to see if early detection of TB outbreaks can happen through monitoring a community’s wastewater.

Purdy said the GN plans to issue a joint message with Nunavut Tunngavik Inc. on March 25 and launch a social media and education campaign about TB.