Doctors Without Borders

551 Adelaide Street West
Toronto, ON M5V 0N8
Executive Director: Joe Belliveau
Board President: Ruby Gill

Charitable Reg. #:13527 5857 RR0001

STAR RATING

Ci's Star Rating is calculated based on the following independent metrics:

[Charity Rating: 5/5]

✔+

FINANCIAL TRANSPARENCY

Audited financial statements for current and previous years available on the charity’s website.

A

RESULTS REPORTING

Grade based on the charity's public reporting of the work it does and the results it achieves.

High

DEMONSTRATED IMPACT

The demonstrated impact per dollar Ci calculates from available program information.

NEED FOR FUNDING

Charity's cash and investments (funding reserves) relative to how much it spends on programs in most recent year.

80%

CENTS TO THE CAUSE

For a dollar donated, after overhead costs of fundraising and admin/management (excluding surplus) 80 cents are available for programs.



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OVERVIEW

About Doctors Without Borders:

Doctors Without Borders Canada is a top-rated, 5-star charity. It has High impact and is a Top International Impact charity. Doctors Without Borders is one of Charity Intelligence's top pick charities for disaster response with a great track record in speed, effectiveness and reporting. 

Founded in 1971, Doctors Without Borders/ Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) is one of the world's largest international aid charities. Its work focuses on medical care around the world. In 2025 MSF operated in 75 countries. MSF’s charter states that it provides aid based solely on need, irrespective of race, religion, gender, or political affiliation.

Doctors Without Borders Canada (MSF Canada) is the Canadian branch of MSF. In F2023, MSF Canada spent $97.8m on programs, including $81.7 million on international programs and $16.1 million spent in Canada.

A Charity Intelligence 2024 Top 10 International Aid Impact Charity.

A Charity Intelligence 2024 Top 100 Rated Charity.

MSF Canada's F2024 annual report and audited financial statements have not been released at the time of writing. Ci has used the reporting of MSF International to report the following information. 

In F2024, MSF’s programmes were mostly carried out in Africa (59%), the Middle East (15%) and the Asia and Pacific regions (12%). In 37% of cases, MSF intervened in areas of armed conflict. 28% of its interventions were in areas of internal instability.

In 2024, MSF did 16.5m outpatient consultations and had 2.5m emergency admissions. Teams delivered nearly 369k births, with a focus on countries facing high maternal mortality rates such as Afghanistan, Sierra Leone, and Yemen. MSF also admitted 209k severely malnourished children into inpatient programs and 585k into outpatient programs. Its efforts were concentrated in crisis zones including Sudan, Nigeria, Niger, and South Sudan.

The charity treated 74k survivors of sexual violence, offering medical care, mental health support, and safe abortion services. Much of this work took place in conflict-affected areas such as the Democratic Republic of Congo, Sudan, and along migration routes. In addition, MSF provided 506k individual mental health consultations.

Some of the charity’s major humanitarian responses in 2024 include:

Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) (€130m): MSF’s largest operation in 2024. Years of conflict have left a critical humanitarian situation. MSF treated conflict-related injuries and responded to disease outbreaks and floods. The charity increased medical, maternal and paediatric care and treated victims of sexual violence. MSF reports that it remains the main provider of water in camps around the city of Goma. In 2024, MSF carried out 2.3m outpatient consultations in DRC and treated 47k survivors for sexual violence.

South Sudan (€119m): MSF’s efforts centered on providing general, specialist and mental health care amid ongoing conflict, mass displacement, flooding and disease outbreak. MSF reports that by the end of 2024, nearly 1m refugees had arrived in Sudan. The charity responded to a cholera outbreak and completed a nine-month vaccination campaign for hepatitis E. It reports that it carried out 804k outpatient consultations and admitted 85k patients to hospital.

Yemen (€116m): Operating in 17 hospitals across 21 governorates, MSF responded to worsening malnutrition and rising vaccine-preventable diseases. In 2024, MSF held 477k outpatient consultations (including 100k for children under five), assisted in 39k births and tackled outbreaks of cholera, acute watery diarrhoea, measles and diphtheria. MSF also provided 17k mental health consultations, noting the severe psychological toll on communities.

Sudan (€106m): Amid the world’s largest displacement crisis, MSF worked in 15 of 18 states, treating the war-wounded, combating cholera, and addressing malnutrition. The organization was one of few humanitarian actors working on the frontlines. In 2024, it delivered 1.1m outpatient consultations, 206k ER admissions and treated 10.7k victims of intentional violence.

Palestine (€85m): MSF significantly scaled up operations in response to Israel's war in Gaza. MSF treated 750k patients despite severe restrictions, repeated attacks on facilities, and the killing of 11 MSF staff members since October 2023. Teams provided 9,370 surgical interventions, 37k antenatal consultations and assisted in 8,700 births. MSF also provided 37k individual mental health consultation and distributed 141m litres of chlorinated water while operating under siege conditions.

Afghanistan (€56m): With the health system collapsing under staff shortages, poverty, and restrictions on women, MSF ran eight projects in eight provinces. In 2024, MSF recorded 459k ER admissions and assisted in 45k births, including 3,120 C-sections. It also admitted 10,600 children to inpatient feeding programs.

Haiti (€48m): Teams provided trauma care, burns treatment, and maternal health services amid escalating gang violence. This violence forced temporary suspension of activities in November after an attack on an MSF ambulance resulted in patient executions. MSF reports a surge of gunshot injuries at Tabarre trauma hospital (from 60 to 100 per month). The charity provided 13.2m litres of chlorinated water, had 9,750 surgical interventions and treated 6,770 victims of intentional violence. The charity reports high and rising maternal death rated in Haiti (154.9/100k in 2022 to 201.2/100k in 2023) and assisted with 1,500 births in 2024.

Ukraine (€16m): Amid the ongoing war with Russia, MSF provided 75.4k consultations and 12.5k mental health sessions to affected communities.

The charity faced major challenges in 2024, including a sharp rise in attacks on staff and facilities, that forced temporary suspensions of activities in several locations. Bureaucratic hurdles, movement restrictions, and obstruction by warring parties further limited MSF’s reach, especially in Gaza, Sudan, Myanmar, and the Sahel region. MSF was also forced to halt certain operations: in Russia, where registration was withdrawn after 32 years; in the Central Mediterranean, where Italian migration laws ended search and rescue missions; and across several Sahel countries, where restrictions reduced humanitarian reach.

The full scale of MSF’s global work does not fit in a single summary. MSF’s 2024 International Activity Report is well laid out and informative.

 

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Results and Impact

MSF responded to multiple epidemics in 2024, including cholera outbreaks in nine countries, measles, mpox (monkey pox) in DRC and Burundi, and hepatitis E in South Sudan. The charity treated 3.9m malaria cases and carried out 1.3m vaccinations against measles in response to an outbreak. It treated 143.8k people for cholera, supported 36.8k people on antiretroviral therapy for HIV/AIDS, started 23.4k patients on first-line tuberculosis treatment, and initiated 4,140 people on hepatitis C treatment.  The charity also rescued 2,280 people at sea through its search and rescue operations.

While Ci highlights these key results, they may not be a complete representation of Doctors Without Borders’s results and impact.

Charity Intelligence has rated Doctors Without Borders as High impact based on demonstrated impact per dollar spent.

A Charity Intelligence 2024 Top 10 International Aid Impact Charity.

 

Impact Rating: High

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Finances

MSF Canada is a Major 100 charity, one of Canada’s largest charities in terms of donations, with $98.0m in donations in F2023. It also received $15.1m in government funding, making up 12% of revenues.

Administrative costs are 3% of revenues and fundraising costs are 17% of donations. This results in a total overhead spending of 20%. For every dollar donated, 80 cents are available to go to the cause. This is within Ci’s reasonable range for overhead spending.

Doctors Without Borders Canada has reserve funds of $24.2m. This is enough to cover program spending at F2023 levels for just under three months.

MSF Canada used external fundraisers. In F2023, it paid external fundraisers $8.8m to raise $30.6m at a cost of $0.29 per dollar raised.

Charity Intelligence has sent this update to Doctors Without Borders for review. Changes and edits may be forthcoming.

Updated on August 19, 2024 by Ben Dobozy and October 3, 2025 by Victoria Allder.



Financial Review


Financial Ratios

Fiscal year ending December
202320222021
Administrative costs as % of revenues 3.1%2.4%2.2%
Fundraising costs as % of donations 17.4%16.5%19.3%
Total overhead spending 20.5%18.9%21.4%
Program cost coverage (%) 24.7%20.7%22.1%

Summary Financial Statements

All figures in $000s
202320222021
Donations 98,01898,55982,237
Government funding 15,11714,88322,500
Investment income 1,093475175
Other income 8,3318,2158,499
Total revenues 122,559122,132113,411
Program costs - International 81,71783,60269,390
Program costs - Canada 16,12816,13714,758
Administrative costs 3,7632,8732,448
Fundraising costs 17,05416,26115,857
Other costs 82(25)47
Total spending 118,744118,848102,500
Cash flow from operations 3,8153,28410,911
Capital spending 14716881
Funding reserves 24,16520,61218,560

Note: Ci classified fees and grants from other MSF sections as other revenue. To report on a cash basis, Ci adjusted international program costs by changes in amounts payable to other MSF sections. This affected international program costs and total expenses by ($3.4m) in F2023, ($2.5m) in F2022, and ($19.5m). In F2020 and F2021, Ci removed amortization from Canadian program costs, administrative costs, and fundraising costs according to information provided by MSF Canada. In F2022 and F2023, Ci used the amortization allocation breakdown from F2021 to back out amortization expenses from program costs, administrative costs, and fundraising costs. Ci adjusted for deferred revenues affecting revenues by ($18,947) in F2023, $69,259 in F2022, and $148,947 in F2021. 

Salary Information

Full-time staff: 142

Avg. compensation: $72,131

Top 10 staff salary range:

$350k +
0
$300k - $350k
0
$250k - $300k
0
$200k - $250k
1
$160k - $200k
0
$120k - $160k
8
$80k - $120k
1
$40k - $80k
0
< $40k
0

Information from most recent CRA Charities Directorate filings for F2023

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Comments & Contact

Comments added by the Charity:

No comments have been added by the charity.

LEARN MORE: 

MSF 2023 International Activity Report - a comprehensive and detailed review of MSF's global operations in 2023. This report shows that MSF spent €23.9 million on its operations in Palestine (including Gaza) which is 1.6% of its 2023 total spending. For context, €139 million spent in Democratic Republic of Congo, €110 million in Yemen, and €108 million in South Sudan.

Ari David Blaff, "Not the MSF I knew: Doctors Without Borders accused of picking side in Israel-Hamas war. Doctors Without Borders claims to be impartial. When it comes to Israel, this is simply 'untrue' critics say." National Post, July 13, 2024

Sana Beg, Doctors Without Borders Canada's Executive Director, Opinion: Canada's call for a ceasefire in Gaza isn't enough, Globe and Mail, October 10, 2024.

Charity Intelligence applauds donors for doing research and internet searches for additional information to make giving decisions that best reflect your values. Thanks for telling us our 2024 update needed additional context.

These additional links were posted December 6, 2024 by Kate Bahen.

 

 

 

Charity Contact

Website: https://www.doctorswithoutborders.ca/
This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. Tel: 416-964-0619

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Charitable Registration Number: 80340 7956 RR0001