A lab technician prepares a prescription at a pharmacy in Quebec City. Use of the federal e-prescribing service, PrescribeIT, remains low despite thousands of pharmacies signing on.Jacques Boissinot/The Canadian Press
Ottawa has cancelled PrescribeIT, a federal program built with Telus Health to replace the use of fax machines in sending prescriptions between doctors and pharmacists, after spending more than a quarter of a billion dollars on the initiative.
Canada Health Infoway, a government-funded non-profit, launched PrescribeIT in 2017 as part of “axe the fax” initiatives to replace the older technology with digital tools in health care settings. In this case, it provided a secure digital way to transmit prescriptions from doctors’ offices to pharmacies.
As of 2026, PrescribeIT is live in eight provinces and territories and being trialled in a ninth, Quebec. It has also seen thousands of pharmacies sign up, including major chains such as Loblaw Cos. Ltd.-owned Shoppers Drug Mart, Metro Ontario Inc. and Walmart Inc., and many hospitals, including Humber River Hospital and the Ottawa Hospital.
Despite the number of providers on board, use of the service has remained low. Less than 5 per cent of prescriptions are sent electronically in Canada each year, according to reports from Canada Health Infoway and Telus Health.
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Canada Health Infoway began informing stakeholders in recent days that it was cancelling PrescribeIT. Two sources with knowledge of the program said it is expected to go offline mid-2026.
The Globe and Mail is not identifying the sources because they were not authorized to share the information.
Canada Health Infoway said it could not comment on the cancellation because of contractual obligations. Spokesperson Haley Armstrong said the organization would provide an update in the coming days.
The non-profit, whose board is mostly made up of representatives from federal, provincial and territorial governments, had begun seeking a private partner to take over the program, according to a request for expressions of interest posted in 2024. That process was in its final stages when the program was abruptly cancelled, according to the sources.
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PrescribeIT had annual costs of around $35-million in recent years, according to Canada Health Infoway’s public records, totalling more than $250-million over the program’s life.
The underlying technology for PrescribeIT was created by Telus Health, which won the contract in 2017. The company, a division of Telus Corp., collected millions of dollars in licensing and service fees each year and still owns much of the intellectual property associated with the program, the sources noted.
Jill Yetman, director of public relations at Telus Health, confirmed the company had received a termination notice for PrescribeIT but said it could not yet provide further details.
Telus Health published a white paper in November that argued written prescriptions were costing health-care providers time and leading to errors. The company did not name PrescribeIT in the paper, but argued that digital prescription tools were more efficient and less prone to errors. The paper cited a 2022 survey of pharmacists, commissioned by Canada Health Infoway, in which half of respondents cited communicating by fax as a top source of workflow dissatisfaction.
The federal government had already begun to reduce funding for PrescribeIT, prompting Canada Health Infoway to start charging pharmacists a fee of $0.20 a prescription for the program in 2025.
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Glen Doucet, chief executive officer of the Canadian Pharmacists Association, said the fee did not encourage adoption of the program. He said he hopes any similar future efforts provide incentives for health-care professionals to participate, “more of a carrot than a stick.”
Canada Health Infoway was created in 2001 by the federal government to help advance the adoption of electronic medical record systems across the country. The non-profit’s most recent multiyear funding agreement with Ottawa was signed in 2023 and expires on March 31 of this year, though a new one could be signed in the coming weeks or months.
The federal government reintroduced a bill last week that would set national standards for sharing and accessing health data, including patient records. It built on a road map developed by Canada Health Infoway and endorsed by provincial and territorial governments.
Mr. Doucet said the work being done by Canada Health Infoway to create shared standards in the health-technology industry will hopefully lead to better use of electronic prescribing, even if PrescribeIT ends.
“I think eventually we’ll see the fax machine be a relic of the past,” he said.