Thirteen people in New Westminster died of toxic unregulated drugs in the first five months of 2023.
Recently released data by the BC Coroners Service states that 1,018 people in British Columbia lost their lives to toxic unregulated drugs from Jan. 1 to May 31, 2023. The preliminary data states that 13 of those people lived in New Westminster.
“BC Coroners Service findings confirm that this public-health emergency continues to be driven by illicit fentanyl,” chief coroner Lisa Lapointe said in a news release. “Expedited testing in 2023 is positive for fentanyl in almost nine out of every 10 results, nearly double the positivity rate of methamphetamine and cocaine, the next most commonly identified substances. As long as people are reliant on the profit-driven unregulated market to access the substances they need, their lives are at risk.”
In a June 19 news release, the BC Coroners Service said the risk of death posed by the unregulated drug supply remains extremely high. It noted, however, the number of deaths in British Columbia due to drug toxicity decreased from near-record levels of 218 in April to 176 in May.
According to the Coroners Service, those 176 deaths equate to about 5.7 lives lost each day in B.C.
“Unregulated drug toxicity is now the leading cause of death in British Columbia for people aged 10 to 59, accounting for more deaths than homicides, suicides, accidents and natural disease combined,” said the coroners service. “The lives of at least 12,264 British Columbians have been lost to unregulated drugs in the seven years since the public health emergency was first declared in April 2016.”
Statistics from the BC Coroners Service shows the number of unregulated drug deaths in New Westminster in the past decade: 2013 – five; 2014 – nine; 2015 – 12; 2016 – 10; 2017 – 24; 2018 – 36; 2019 – 20; 2020 – 36; 2021 – 46; and 2022 – 32.
