{"id":679845,"date":"2026-05-19T15:03:11","date_gmt":"2026-05-19T15:03:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/679845\/"},"modified":"2026-05-19T15:03:11","modified_gmt":"2026-05-19T15:03:11","slug":"fifa-world-cup-is-canadas-health-care-system-ready","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/679845\/","title":{"rendered":"FIFA World Cup: Is Canada\u2019s health-care system ready?"},"content":{"rendered":"

As thousands get ready to gather in Toronto and Vancouver for FIFA, public health experts say the events could spread illnesses. Kamil Karamali reports. <\/p>\n

While both Toronto and Vancouver brace for roughly 300 thousand visitors to flood into their cities in less than a month for the FIFA World Cup, Canada\u2019s health agency is warning of a \u201chigh risk\u201d of measles spread<\/a> from the domestic and international tourists that will be mingling for the matches in the two cities. Doctors are warning about what that could do to an already overburdened health-care system, should a worst-case scenario take place.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think the challenge as somebody who works in the system now, with the worst-case scenario, is that the system is already operating at a 100 per cent capacity,\u201d Gerald Evans, medical director of infection prevention and control at Kingston Health Sciences Centre told CTV News Saturday. \u201cIn the event of a major outbreak\u2026 that can really overwhelm the health-care system hugely because we\u2019re already working at one hundred percent capacity.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cEven with all the preparations that you\u2019d have at the first responder level, where you\u2019ve got plenty of paramedics \u2013 they\u2019re delivering to the hospitals,\u201d Evans said. \u201c(And) the hospitals are overwhelmed and are full of people already. So, emergency departments and other places like that are really going to be completely overwhelmed.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Public Health Agency of Canada<\/a> examined 14 infectious disease pathogens with the potential of spreading during the global event and found that two had a \u201chigher likelihood\u201d of being imported and widely transmitted, with measles deemed as \u201chigh risk\u201d and Clade Ib Mpox virus, formerly known as monkeypox listed as a \u201cmoderate risk.\u201d<\/p>\n

The agency listed all others, like poliovirus and Ebola virus, having a low or negligible risk.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s expected to see that measles is topping that list because of how readily measles communicate,\u201d Dr. Dale Kalina Samji, Chief Medical Information Officer at Brant Community Healthcare System told CTV News Saturday.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe reality is, in most of the communities, particularly that surround Toronto and also in Alberta, we see lower vaccine rates. As a result, we\u2019ve got a very high risk for diseases like measles to spread like wildfire.\u201d<\/p>\n

Canada\u2019s measles vaccination rate has declined in recent years, with public health officials warning that immunization coverage in several provinces has fallen below the roughly 95 per cent threshold needed to prevent outbreaks.<\/p>\n

Canada experienced its worst measles resurgence over the past two years when an outbreak began in late 2024 and accelerated sharply through 2025, resulting in more than 5,400 cases nationwide \u2014 marking the country\u2019s largest outbreak since the virus was declared as eliminated in 1998.<\/p>\n

Since then, the outbreak has significantly slowed across Canada, with national weekly reports showing far fewer new cases and some provinces declaring the end of outbreaks or moving to sporadic imported cases only. <\/p>\n

Although the decline in cases continues across the country, it remains elevated globally \u2013 particularly in countries such as Mexico, the United States, Bangladesh, Romania and parts of Europe, where significant outbreaks are still ongoing due to declining vaccination coverage and post-pandemic immunity gaps. <\/p>\n

\u201cIn the case of the FIFA World Cup, there are a lot of people there are going to come from around the world, from a lot of the countries where measles is endemic,\u201d Dr. Zahid Butt, an infectious disease epidemiologist and assistant professor at the University of Waterloo told CTV News Saturday. \u201cWhich means that (they) may not have up-to-date vaccinations and that (they) can pose a risk of transmission to other people.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"Measles notepad The end of a major outbreak and some gains in MMR coverage are hopeful glimmers, but experts say that the work to stop measles and other vaccine-preventable diseases is far from over. (Sean Rayford\/Getty Images\/File via CNN Newsource) \u2018We are already understaffed\u2019<\/p>\n

Physicians who spoke to CTV News now question whether Canada\u2019s overburdened health-care system would be able to supply the resources \u2013 such as beds and hospital staff \u2013 in the event a worst-case scenario of a large outbreak takes place.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think we are already understaffed, and this is something we need to seriously think about, particularly ahead of the World Cup,\u201d Butt added.<\/p>\n

\u201cHow are you going to get additional staff? How are you going to transfer one staff to another place where they\u2019re required?\u201d he said. \u201cThat planning has to be there before the World Cup because it\u2019s already understaffed, overburdened.\u201d<\/p>\n

While Evans believes that it\u2019s not just measles that is at risk of spreading, but that provincial health agencies must be prepared for even cases of low-risk diseases spiking.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think the worst-case scenario would be if we do see a massive spread of contagious illnesses \u2013 be it measles or Mpox or the respiratory virus or a gastrointestinal illness \u2013 that would then overwhelm our already taxed medical system. I think that\u2019s a particular concern,\u201d Evans said. \u201cIt is what has been prepared for, but it would be concerning to see individuals who can prevent illness like this having to come into emergency departments and that sort of thing.\u201d<\/p>\n

In a statement to CTV News B.C.\u2019s Ministry of Health said there will be \u201cenhanced public health surveillance activities\u201d during the FIFA World Cup to \u201cdetect any importation of communicable diseases.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAs part of the planning for FIFA World Cup matches and gatherings in Vancouver, BCCDC completed a public health risk assessment in collaboration with regional and provincial public health partners,\u201d the B.C. Ministry of Health said. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe risk assessment considered increased population density, close contact among people in indoor and outdoor venues, higher demands on food services, summer heat, potential wildfires during this period, and changes in social behaviour and transportation. Most public health risks were categorized as low, with some assessed as moderate.\u201d<\/p>\n

While Ontario did not respond for comment, a recent Public Health Ontario infectious diseases risk assessment<\/a> for the World Cup showed measles, food and waterborne diseases, and COVID-19 had a \u201cmoderate risk\u201d of spreading.<\/p>\n

The report says that during the event, there will be \u201crobust surveillance,\u201d and that provincial and local authorities should \u201ccontinue to scan local, national and global public health signals that might warrant action or impact.\u201d<\/p>\n

Infectious disease specialist at Toronto General Hospital, Dr. Isaac Bogoch says that the risk of an outbreak is minimal, even with slumping vaccination rates because much of the older population has already had the disease, making them immune for life.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen we\u2019re talking about measles, let\u2019s remember this: the vast majority of Canadians are okay,\u201d Bogoch told CTV News Saturday. \u201cPeople born before 1970s are presumed to have been infected, then recovered, and have lifelong immunity. Those born after 1970, the vast majority have had the vaccination and the vaccination provides very significant and durable protection.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThis would only be concerning for people who are not immune to measles, which would be smaller groups of individuals who have not received the measles vaccine,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"As thousands get ready to gather in Toronto and Vancouver for FIFA, public health experts say the events…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":679846,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[712,49,48,84,392],"class_list":["post-679845","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-healthcare","tag-apple-news","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-health","tag-healthcare"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/679845","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=679845"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/679845\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/679846"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=679845"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=679845"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=679845"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}