More than 2,500 people died from unregulated, toxic drugs in B.C. last year, with fentanyl continuing to be a major driver.
The powerful opioid has been detected in 86 per cent of deaths each year between 2017 and 2023, according to B.C. Chief Coroner Lisa Lapointe, who provided an update on the public health emergency on Wednesday.
“Your child, brother, sister, mom dad friend or colleague did not deserve to die this way. Their death was preventable. Their loss — your loss — is our collective loss,” Lapointe said. “How many more families will join these statistics next year?”
Since the crisis was declared in April 2016, she said 13,794 lives have been lost. The province’s experts estimate some 225,000 British Columbians are currently accessing the drugs through the illicit market, Lapointe added.
Last year was the third in a row that more than 2,000 people died in B.C. from unregulated, toxic drugs. Seventy-seven per cent of them were men, and 70 per cent were between the ages of 30 and 59, according to the coroner’s office.
The highest rates of death were in Vancouver in the area that includes the Downtown Eastside, along with Hope, Port Alberni and the Clayoquot area, Terrace, and Greater Campbell River.
Eighty per cent of unregulated deaths took place indoors and 19 per cent occurred outside. A single death occurred at an overdose prevention site — the first one on record.
For many months, unregulated drug toxicity has been the leading cause of death in B.C. for people between the ages of 10 and 59, surpassing murders, suicides, natural diseases and accidents.
It takes an average of six to seven lives in the province each day.
In December, her office’s expert death review panel vouched for expanded access to safer supply as the “fastest way to reduce deaths” amid the crisis. That panel said a prescription-free model is the most viable, scalable short-term option to save lives, as an estimated 225,000 British Columbians are currently at risk of drug injury or death.
As it stands, prescribed safer supply is only accessed by about 5,000 people in B.C. each month. There continues to be “no indication” that prescribed safer supply is contributed to unregulated drug deaths.
In 2023, the coroner’s office said hydromorphone — a prescribed alternative also known under the brand name Dilaudid — was only detected in three per cent of unregulated drug deaths that underwent expedited toxicology testing.
Lapointe said that’s not statistically significant when considering what factors drive toxic drug deaths.
Lapointe has been a fierce public advocate for safer supply in the province and echoed the panel’s concerns on Wednesday.
“Prescribed safer supply is simply not able to address the scale of the public health emergency in which we find ourselves,” she said. “One million people in our province don’t have access to a family doctor, never mind the focused and specialized expertise needed to address a public health emergency of this magnitude.”
British Columbia will continue to “count the dead” without an expanded supply model, Lapointe said.
Mental Health and Addictions Minister Jennifer Whiteside has already rejected the suggestion of prescription-free substances. In her own Wednesday press conference, she said the province’s working to address the “spectrum of need,” including housing, treatment and recovery.
“I want to assure British Columbians that my commitment to ending this crisis is unwavering,” Whiteside said.
“We know that when someone makes the brave decision to seek help, they need to be met with access to the services that they need and they need care that is specific to their own unique needs. We do know that we are making a difference.”
Whiteside referenced recent research published in the British Medical Journal that found people with an opioid-use disorder who were prescribed a day or more’s worth of opioids in B.C. were 61-per cent less likely to die the following week than those who did not.
Pressed on her rejection of the coroner’s recommendation on adopting a prescription-free safer supply model, the minister referenced the study again. Work is underway to improve access to prescribed safer supply, she added.
In its 2023 budget, the province committed $1 billion to addressing the crisis over the next three years. The province has pointed to new investments in addictions beds and recovery care, an expanded scope of practice for nurses, and the expansion of 24/7 substance-use and mental health supports as examples of its action to combat the crisis.
In a news release, Whiteside said the province has made “significant progress” last year in that regard.
“We have opened hundreds of treatment and recovery beds. We are scaling up access to virtual care and outpatient care,” she said. “All of those measures are critical in our goal to ensure we can connect people to the care and support that they need.”
British Columbia almost a year into its experiment with decriminalization, which allows adults to possess small amounts of certain drugs — opioids, crack, cocaine, methamphetamine and MDMA — for personal use.
On Wednesday, BC United Leader Kevin Falcon called that pilot program “disastrous,” having “recklessly endangered lives,” in a post on social media.
Whiteside accused Falcon of “spreading misinformation that will not help to save a single life in this crisis.”
In the context of decriminalization, Lapointe said the use of the toxic drug crisis for “political fodder is extremely disappointing.”
Lapointe is preparing to retire on Feb. 18 after many years of public service, making Wednesday her final public event. Asked if she had advice for her successor, she emphasized the importance of collaboration.
“Those relationships across public health, across law enforcement, across the criminal justice system, across health authorities — critical,” Lapointe said. “We need to talk to each other. We cannot be polarized and we are not.”
The chief coroner also pointed to the value of good data collection, so that when questions come up about the diversion of prescribed safer supply, for example, there’s a body of information to work with.
In her Wednesday address, Whiteside thanked Lapointe for her years of service and support during some of the toughest health crises the province has ever faced.