More lives are being lost to fentanyl and other illicit drugs in Nanaimo than ever before. (File Photo/NanaimoNewsNOW)

By NanaimoNewsNOW Staff

more lives lost

Nanaimo shatters record for drug toxicity deaths with four months still remaining

Sep 25, 2023 | 2:25 PM

NANAIMO — More people have died locally from toxic drugs so far in 2023 compared to any previous year.

Data from the BC Coroners Service (BCCS) up to the end of August, showed 84 people lost their lives in the Nanaimo region from drug toxicity, including eight last month alone.

The number of deaths is a sharp increase on the record 77 fatalities from all of 2022 and if the current pace holds, over 120 people will have lost their lives to illegal street drugs in Nanaimo by year’s end.

Province-wide 1,645 people were killed by toxic drugs in the first eight months of the year, on pace to eclipse last year’s provincial record of 2,383 fatalities.

“We are continuing to lose members of our communities in heartbreaking numbers as a result of the toxicity of the illicit drug market,” Lisa Lapointe, chief coroner, said. “No town, neighbourhood or family is immune from this crisis…more and more British Columbians are experiencing the devastating loss of a friend, colleague or family member to the illicit-drug supply.”

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Nearly two-thirds of people who died from toxic drugs in the province so far this year succumbed while smoking drugs, the BCCS noted.

Through the same time period, Jan. 1 through Aug. 31, 146 people died across the vast central Vancouver Island region.

While not a record yet (167 lives were lost set in 2022), current pace dictates well over 200 people will succumb to drug toxicity by the new year on the central island region (Cowichan Valley to Qualicum Beach/ Alberni Valley to the west coast).

Central Vancouver Island was noted by the coroner’s service to have the third highest rate of fatalities (deaths per 100,000 people) among health service delivery areas.

A total of 174 people died province-wide in August from drug toxicity, among 1,645 people who have lost their lives through the first eight months of the year.

Lapointe added in her written statement accompanying the data, “urgent, collaborative action” is required by all levels of government.

“Improvements in the quality and reach of harm reduction and evidence-based treatment services are essential, as is the critical need to ensure that those at risk of dying can access safer, regulated drugs. If we cannot implement these changes, our loved ones will continue to die.”

Numbers of fatalities through August represent the lowest such monthly tally since July 2022, however, the BC Coroner’s Service warns drawing conclusions from individual months can be misleading.

As has become typical through the public health crisis, a vast majority of victims continue to be working-aged men.

Seventy-eight per cent of those killed through toxic drugs in 2023 to date were male, with 70 per cent aged 30 to 59.

Fentanyl continues to drive overdoses and drug toxicity deaths, present in 85 per cent of testing.

Nearly 13,000 people in the province have died from tainted drugs since a public health emergency was declared in April 2016.

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