Manitoba declares public health emergency as HIV rates rise

The responsibility of Manitoba has stated a public wellness exigency related to to HIV as it continues to see some of the highest rates of the disease in Canada, the provincial chief public health officer announced Thursday.

"In 2024, we reported a rate of 19.5 cases per 100,000 [people], which is roughly 3½ times that of Canada's rate of 5.5," Dr. Brent Roussin said at a news conference Thursday.

"This emergency is driven by a number of factors, one being injection drug use, homelessness, mental health issues, as well as a rise in other sexually transmitted and blood-borne infections, as well as various barriers to access to care."

Rates of the disease have "sharply risen over the last number of years," he said.

There were 328 new cases reported in 2025 — more than double the 142 cases recorded in 2021, and more than three times more than the 90 cases seen in 2019.

The province will focus on reducing new infections, improving access to care, supporting people living with HIV and addressing the factors that continue to drive transmission in Manitoba, Roussin said.

"This emergency — it's not about creating fear. It's about acknowledging the reality that individuals and communities are facing right now and to address that with a level of urgency."

In 2024, about 70 per cent of HIV transmission in Manitoba was related to injection drug use. Heterosexual transmission was another major factor, Roussin said.

"Those are the biggest drivers of the transmission right now."

The risk of transmission in Manitoba also differs from national trends, as over half of cases in the province are in female patients, compared to a 32 per cent average across Canada, the province said in a news release.

Most newly diagnosed female patients are younger than 40, which increases the risk of perinatal cases, the province said.

Infants were born with the disease twice in recent years — once in 2024 and once in 2025, the province said. The last case before that was recorded in 2021.

The complex issues factoring into Manitoba's high rates of the disease "require much more than simply a public health response," Roussin said.

"We are collaborating with Indigenous leadership, community organizations [and] federal partners to address the conditions driving HIV transmission," he said. "We want to increase awareness, increase access to prevention, testing and harm reduction."

The highest rates are in the Northern Regional Health Authority and the Prairie Mountain Health region in the province's southwest, but the Winnipeg health region continues to see the highest number of cases overall, he said.

Indigenous people are disproportionately affected by HIV, one of the ongoing effects of colonization, Roussin said.

"This is significant, it's concerning, and it requires a co-ordinated action across governments, communities and health systems."

---

---