(File photo/Vernon Matters Staff)

By Pete McIntyre

BC Coroner's Service

Report shows spike in homelessness deaths in Vernon

Dec 14, 2023 | 1:20 PM

A new report says that 35 individuals experiencing homelessness died in Vernon over the last eight years including a high of 13 people in 2022.

That was up from the four deaths in the city in 2021.

Kelowna had 66 deaths over the last eight years, including 14 last year, while Kamloops had 62 overall and 20 in 2022.

The study by the BC Coroner’s Service looked at the period between Jan. 1, 2015, to Dec. 31, 2022.

Around B.C., there were 1,464 deaths among individuals experiencing homelessness over that time span.

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Between 2015-2020, the annual average was 143 deaths, but that spiked to 305 in 2021-2022. In 2022, there were 342 reported deaths, which equates to a 28 per cent increase from the 2021 total (267 deaths) and a 138 per cent increase from 2020 (144 deaths).

By classification, from 2015-2022, 81 per cent of deaths were considered accidental, followed by 11 per cent classified as natural and 5 per cent as suicides.

Suspected unregulated drug toxicity deaths accounted for 91 per cent of all accidental deaths during the study period. Unregulated drug toxicity deaths remained the highest proportion of accidental deaths at 93 per cent in 2022.

(Image credit: BC Coroner’s Service)

The townships with the highest number of deaths over the eight-year period were Vancouver (306), Surrey (146), and Victoria (118).

The data presented in the report is based on suspected homelessness where ‘no fixed address’ was given as the decedent’s home address; the injury premise was identified as a homeless shelter; or the preliminary circumstances of death suggested homelessness based on the following definition:

An individual experiencing homelessness is defined as:

• A person living outdoors, in a make-shift shelter, a parked vehicle, a vacant home, or any other structure not intended for habitation.

• A person staying at an emergency shelter (overnight) or who is temporarily sheltered (suspected to be for less than 30 days) by friends or family, in a short-term shelter, safe house for youth, or transition house for women and children fleeing violence. Persons residing in short-term shelters, safe houses, or transition houses for an unknown length of time were also included.

Deaths occurred more often in the fall (27 per cent) and winter (26 per cent) months of the year.

Overall, 82 per cent of the victims were male.

To read the Coroner’s Service report, click here.