Who is dying of toxic drug overdoses & where? Unemployed middle-aged male construction workers up north, that’s who

With more than 15,000 dead family members since a public health emergency was declared, no demographic is untouched but stats do show some trends

If you know a 48-year-old guy who is an unemployed construction worker on social assistance in, say, Fort St. John, you might want to check in on him on the third Wednesday of the month.

That person’s demographic profile ticks all the boxes in recent statistics for those at risk of a toxic drug overdose or, in the latest vernacular of BC Coroners Service, an “unregulated drug death.”

Anyone addicted to fentanyl in the Downtown Eastside on any day of the week may have a chance of dying higher than anyone else, but there are some trends that can be teased out of the monthly statistics.

• Who is dying? 
• When are they dying? 
• Where are they dying? 
• What exactly is killing them?
• And where? 

Here’s a look at some of the statistics from the monthly unregulated drug toxicity update sent out by the BC Coroners Service via the Ministry of Public Safety and Solicitor General, including a new metric added this week: occupation industry.

Who is dying?

More than 15,000 people have died since April 2016 when British Columbia declared a public health emergency over the toxic drug crisis.

The peak was 2023 when 2,511 lives were lost, according to provincial statistics and while the number went down in 2024 and continues that trend for the first half of 2025, there are still five people dying every day.

People across the gender and age demographics are dying, from teenagers to senior citizens, men, women, even rarely children. But something happened with the 50-59 demographic after the pandemic hit. 

For the first six months of 2025, 60.5 deaths per 100,000 people in the 40-49 demographic died followed closely by 57.4 in the 50-59 age group, 46.4 in 30-39, 37.2 in 60-69, and 24.2 in 19-29.

But 40-somethings have only led the death toll since 2023 before which 50-somethings topped the death rate list starting in mid-2020 until 2023. Pre-pandemic, it was the 30-39 demographic that led the death toll rate from 2014 to 2019.

On the new measure tracked, occupation industry, the vast majority of those dying work in the broad category of trades, transport, equipment operators at 21 per cent. That’s the highest category that is known, because the highest category by far, rendering this statistic somewhat unhelpful, is “unknown” at 55 per cent of deaths. After people working in construction, the second category at 10 per cent is sales and service, with all others in the one to four per cent range.

As for gender, some things remain the same. This is predominantly an epidemic affecting men. In 2014, 77 per cent of those who died were male. This year it has been 78 per cent men so far and the number has varied between a low of 75 per cent in 2024 to 82 per cent in 2017.

What’s killing them?

We all know by now that fentanyl and its analogues are the problem. Fentanyl is in fact why were are in a toxic-drug overdose crisis as declared in 2016 when fentanyl passed cocaine as the main killer. 

But it’s not just fentanyl.

“Decedents who underwent expedited testing in 2025 were found to have fentanyl in their systems (70 per cent), followed by methamphetamine (52 per cent) and cocaine (51 per cent),” according to the BC Coroners Service. 

Fentanyl was considered a relevant drug in 24.6 per cent of deaths in 2014, 28.6 per cent in 2015, and it jumped to 65.9 per cent in 2016, 81.7 per cent in 2017, and 85.3 per cent in 2018 and it hasn’t changed much since then.

Cocaine has been considered a relevant drug in 52.2 per cent of deaths in 2014 to 48.5 per cent in 2024 with some variation as low as 40.7 per cent in 2022.

Then there is crystal meth and other amphetamines involved in just 16.5 per cent of deaths in 2014 and having a steady rising effect to 50.5 per cent in 2024 and 52 per cent this year.

But benzodiazepnies have showed the most dramatic increase in the last decade involved in just three per cent of deaths in 2014 fluctuating around that number until 6.8 per cent in 2019, 13.7 per cent in 2020, 29 per cent in 2021 then up and up to 48.8 per cent in 2024.

Alcohol was involved in 28.9 per cent of deaths in 2014, which has slowly declined to 17.4 per cent in 2024.

How are users who die consuming drugs?

Many people have an image of a drug overdose involving needles but that’s not been the case for a long time. For several years, the main mode of consumption is smoking, from 73 per cent in January 2023 spiking up and down to 67 per cent in June 2025. Injection has only been the method of consumption in 19 per cent of deaths two years ago down to 10 per cent last month. 

Because so many people die alone, the second highest percentage of deaths in the statistics is the category of method of consumption is unkownn at around one in four.

When are they dying?

People are dying every day but in 2025, the number of deaths following ‘welfare Wednesday’ – income assistance payment day – is one third higher than other days of the month, namely 6.4 compared to 4.8, a statistic that is mostly unchanged over the last decade.

Where are people dying?

The cities experiencing the highest number of unregulated drug deaths so far in 2025 are obviously Vancouver, the most populous and home to the Downtown Eastside, as well as Surrey and Greater Victoria. 

After those major centres, Kelowna is fourth followed by Abbotsford, Nanaimo, Kamloops, and Prince George.

But those are raw numbers and reflect populations. A more interesting statistic is the rate of deaths per 100,000 people. Statistics are broken down by muncipality, by local health authority, by health service delivery area, and by health authority. 

A statistic that jumps out is that from 2014 to 2019, Vancouver Coastal had the highest rate per 100,000 hitting 37.3 in 2017. But while every other health authority saw a statistical insignificant change between 2017 and 2018, the Northern Health Authority’s (NHA) jumped 50 per cent from 22.6 to 34.8. All health authorities saw a promising drop from 2018 to 2019 of on average 38 per cent. 

Then the pandemic hit and not only did every health authority see a spike in 2020, a provincewide rate of 77.5 per cent from 19.4 to 34.4, in the north it was the worst where the NHA rate more than doubled from 22.8 to 46.3 and it led the province since then, spiking in 2023 at 70.9 deaths per 100,000, which compared to Vancouver Coastal at 56.3 and a B.C. average of 46.9.

Why are people dying?

Well that’s a whole topic not addressed easily or directly with statistics. 

The Chief Coroner’s Nov. 1, 2023 report entitled BC Coroners Service Death Review Panel: An Urgen Response to a Continuing Crisis offers some answer and is worth a read.

The simple answer is because of an unregulated and toxic drug supply. Fentanyl, cocaine, crystal meth, are illegal substances so they cannot be regulated so what is sold on the street is dangerous. 

“A comprehensive, culturally safe system of substance use education, prevention, harm reduction, treatment and social support was needed before the public health emergency was declared,” said Michael Egilson, chair of the Death Review Panel. “It is still required to address the crisis today.”

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Paul J. Henderson
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