Homeless people in Edmonton are dying at 8 times the rate as pre-pandemic

Chris Jonasson's life started off with great promise.

A talented football player, Jonasson was also kind and stood up for other kids who were being bullied.

"He was incredibly smart. They actually wanted to skip him ahead of grade in school," his sister Lisa Meyer said in an interview this month at her home in Beaumont, Alta.

While he was still in elementary school, two chance tragedies changed Jonasson. He discovered the body of a classmate who had died by suicide, and later his best friend died suddenly.

Meyer believes those unresolved traumas led to her brother's lifelong struggle with drug addiction and an adulthood spent in and out of jail and living on the streets.

Jonasson died on Sept. 28, 2023, after overdosing in the Herb Jamieson Centre — a central Edmonton shelter.

The 51-year-old is one of 302 people with no fixed address who died in Edmonton in 2023.

Data provided by Alberta Justice shows that over the past five years, the number of homeless people who die annually in Edmonton has increased dramatically — from 37 in 2019 to 302 in 2023. In Calgary, that number has risen from 51 to 294 in the same time period. The ministry would not release the causes of death, citing privacy legislation.

Death numbers climbed alongside the overall size of Edmonton's homeless population, which doubled during the pandemic. In late 2019 it was about 1,390, but as of this January it was 2,868, according to Homeward Trust.

Calgary's homeless population decreased by just over four per cent between 2018 and 2022, when a point in time survey counted 2,782 individuals. 

Outreach workers and an Edmonton doctor say that the majority of deaths are the result of drug poisoning, but that people living on the streets have also died of hypothermia, smoke inhalation and burning to death while trying to find ways to keep warm, as well as other medical conditions exacerbated by sleeping rough.

They say the increase in deaths reveals a desperate need for safe consumption options, as well as housing and psychological supports to go along with addiction treatment.

"Our thoughts are with Albertans who have lost loved ones while experiencing homelessness/no fixed address," the justice ministry said in a statement. 

Alberta isn't the only Canadian province reporting an increase in deaths in its homeless population. In British Columbia, the number has risen annually over the past decade, from a few dozen reported deaths to now hundreds per year. In 2022, B.C. saw 342 deaths of people who were homeless.