British Columbia's chief coroner says 2,511 people died of suspected illicit drug poisoning last year, the highest annual toll ever recorded.
Close to 14,000 people have died since the province declared a public health emergency in April 2016, Lisa Lapointe told a news conference on Wednesday.
The surging death toll is a direct result of the powerful opioid fentanyl, which continues to be the main driver in drug deaths, she said.
Lapointe said asking doctors to prescribe a safe supply will not address the crisis.
"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," she said.
"Unless we are willing to act thoughtfully, carefully and with courage to provide a safer supply for the tens of thousands of people at risk in our province, we will continue to count the dead, more people will suffer and more families will grieve."
Lapointe said thousands of people have died preventable deaths since the emergency was declared, with a focus on policing and punishment instead of the underlying reasons for drug use such as pain, trauma and mental health issues.
She said 70 per cent of those who died last year were between the ages of 30 and 59, and more than three quarters were male.
The highest rates of death were in Vancouver's Downtown Eastside and in Hope, a community of about 6,000 at the eastern end of the Fraser Valley.
It's estimated that 225,000 people in B.C. access their drugs from the toxic, illicit market, putting them all at risk, the chief coroner said.
People who use drugs are "not bad people," but family members and friends and the politicization of the overdose crisis has been "extremely disappointing," she said.
A statement from the group Moms Stop The Harm said it's evident that actions the B.C. government has taken so far have had no effect to reduce a death rate of about seven people every day.
"Money and resources spent have not made any impact," the group said.
"As a result, people who use drugs in B.C., including our most vulnerable citizens, continue to be at risk. Courageous and bold action must be taken, and instead politicians posture for their own gains."
"B.C. should be playing a leadership role on resolving the toxic drug crisis. Instead, the province is again leading the country's overdose deaths," the statement said.
The overdose death toll dipped in 2019 to fewer than 1,000 deaths, but those numbers surged through the pandemic to a high of more than 2,300 people in 2021 only to be surpassed by the 2023 figure.
