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Overdose toll hit 198 in January, down 10 percent but over 6 deaths a day

Darpan News Desk The Canadian Press, 29 Feb, 2024 04:58 PM

The overdose death toll in January reached 198 people, down about 10 per cent from the same month last year, but still more than six deaths a day.

The B-C Coroners Service says the majority of those who died were male and the highest death rate was in north and central Vancouver Island and the northern Interior.

More than 14-thousand people have now died since the government declared a public health emergency in April 2016.

Jennifer Whiteside, the minister of mental health and addictions, says the government is strengthen and expanding an entire system of care, and added 117 million dollars in services in the latest budget along with one billion the government committed over three years in last year's budget. (

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