A new report shows drug overdose deaths up to October 2025 in Lethbridge. (Image Credit: (c) Steveheap | Dreamstime.com)

By David Opinko

Drug overdose deaths down 90 per cent in Lethbridge in two years

Feb 2, 2026 | 2:41 PM

Although one death from drug consumption is still one too many, a new report shows that Lethbridge is continuing to move in the right direction.

The Alberta Substance Use Surveillance System has been updated to show statistics up to October 2025, where one person in the city lost their life due to an overdose.

That brings the year-to-date total to 11.

According to the report, this is the lowest number of drug overdose deaths in Lethbridge since 2016, when eight people died in the same period.

These numbers have been falling drastically in recent years. The peak was in 2023, when, during the first 10 months of that year, there were 109 deaths.

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This represents a decrease of approximately 90 per cent compared to just two years ago.

Fatal drug overdose deaths in Lethbridge for January to October, 2016-2025. (Image Credit: Source: Alberta Substance Use Surveillance System. Compiled by LNN)

Lethbridge had just over half of the provincial rate of fatal overdoses at 12 per 100,000 population, compared with the Alberta average of 22.

It had the fifth-highest rate among Alberta’s seven largest cities. Edmonton had the highest rate at 54.4 deaths per 100,000 residents, while Fort McMurray was the lowest at 8.4.

Rate of fatal overdoses in Alberta cities for January-October, 2016-2025. (Image Credit: Source: Alberta Substance Use Surveillance System. Compiled by LNN)

EMS responded to 46 overdose-related events in Lethbridge between July and September, or approximately 15 every month.

There were 165 visits to emergency departments in the South Zone related to substance use in the third quarter of this year, which is down by 45 per cent compared to the same quarter two years ago.

The government also reported 15,574 visits to the Lethbridge Overdose Prevention Site in Q2 this year, which is up by 17 per cent from the same time last year. It is, however, significantly lower than the usage of the former ARCHES Supervised Consumption Site, which saw as many as 59,901 visits in the second quarter of 2019.

In instances where multiple substances were found in the victim’s body provincially, fentanyl was detected 94 per cent of the time, while carfentanyl was present in 67 per cent of cases, and methamphetamine in 66 per cent.

A little over three-quarters (76 per cent) of fatal drug overdose victims in Alberta were men, and the most common age group was 35-39.

You can read the full Alberta Opioid Surveillance System report online here.

@lethbridgenewsnow Fatal overdoses down 90% in Lethbridge. Learn more at LethbridgeNewsNow.com #YQL #LNN #Lethbridge #Alberta #News ♬ original sound – Lethbridge News Now