Theme: Epidemiology & Public Health Research Year: 2024
Background: In the United States, the number of drug-poisoning deaths has been shown to follow an exponential growth curve, increasing on average by 9% per year since the 1980s, suggesting that current trends are a result of long-standing processes. It is unclear if a similar pattern exists in Canada. We investigated the pattern of accidental drug poisoning deaths in Canada over the past two decades to determine if they follow an exponential trajectory.
Method: Death information for 2000-2022 was obtained from the Canadian Vital Statistics — Death Database, which included the number of accidental drug poisoning deaths recorded each year by age and sex. Population data were sourced from Statistics Canada. An exponential curve was fitted to trends in drug-poisoning death rates, and this model was used to calculate the average yearly percentage increases. Model fit was assessed using R-squared (R²). We calculated the change in age-standardized mortality rates per 100,000 population over 2000 and 2022, and projected drug-poisoning deaths to 2030 based on current trends.
Results: Over the 23-year study period, we documented a total of 60,556 poisoning deaths in Canada. The data closely followed an exponential growth pattern (R² = 0.95), with an estimated average annual increase of 9.01%. In 2000, the age-standardized mortality rate due to poisoning was 3.15/100,000. By 2022, this rate was nearly 5-times greater (15.51/100,000). If current trends persist, Canada could see 11,000 drug poisoning deaths annually in 2030, reaching a rate of 28.4/100,000.
Conclusion: Although an adulterated drug supply is the acute cause of the current drug poisoning epidemic, our findings suggest the existence of long-standing factors underlying this phenomenon. These factors have not yet been definitively determined, but significant drug policy reform is likely required to curb the current trends.