Provinces and territories: Rates of disability

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The 2006 Participation and Activity Limitation Survey: Analytical report ›

Quebec reports the lowest provincial disability rates
Provincial and territorial age distributions have a big impact on disability rates
Fewer mild disabilities are reported in Quebec
Population aging explains some growth in provincial disability rates

Quebec reports the lowest provincial disability rates

The reporting of disability rates varied across the country, ranging from 10.4% in Quebec to 20.0% in Nova Scotia. Of the remaining provinces, those in the east had higher disability rates, on average, than those in the west. Ontario reported a disability rate (15.5%), slightly higher than the national rate.

For the first time, in 2006, PALS was conducted in Canada's three territories, the Yukon, the Northwest Territories, and Nunavut. Among Canada's three territories, the Yukon had the highest disability rate at 13.5% followed by the Northwest Territories at 8.6% and Nunavut at 6.4%.

Provincial and territorial age distributions have a big impact on disability rates

The age distributions in the Canadian provinces and territories vary considerably. Some areas, such as Alberta and the three territories, have populations that are much younger on average than other provinces such as Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and Saskatchewan.

The rate of disability rises as the population ages so the demographic make-up of a province or territory has an impact on its overall disability rate. Chart 6 provides a comparison of the age standardized disability rates for the provinces and territories. The relatively young populations in the three territories and Alberta explain much of the inter-provincial variation but differences remain. Age standardized disability rates in Quebec remain the lowest at 10.2%, followed by Nunavut (12.8%) and the Northwest Territories (13.1%). The highest provincial age-standardized disability rate is in Nova Scotia (18.9%) followed by New Brunswick at 16.4%.

Fewer mild disabilities are reported in Quebec

The disability rate for Quebec was lower relative to the other provinces, not only in general but for each severity group (Chart 8). The only exception was among those with very severe disabilities with Alberta, Prince Edward Island, Saskatchewan, and Quebec recording similar disability rates. The greatest difference, however, between the Quebec and the national proportions of people reporting a mild, moderate, severe, or very severe disability was among those reporting mild activity limitations. The rate of mild disabilities among residents of Quebec was two thirds of the Canadian rate of mild disabilities. The rates of the three more severe groups ranged from 73.8% to 76.4% of the national rate. This suggests that fewer persons with mild disabilities in Quebec are reporting their activity limitations.

Population aging explains some growth in provincial disability rates

Between 2001 and 2006, the provincial disability rates increased in all jurisdictions. These increases ranged from a low of 1.1 percentage points in Alberta to a high of 2.9 percentage points in Nova Scotia. Again, population aging explains part of this increase. Table 3 and Chart 9 show the disability rates by province, age standardized to the 2001 age distribution. Population aging explains more of the growth in the disability rate among the Atlantic Provinces, which have experienced a more significant change in their population distribution since 2001.

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