Drug overdoses decline slightly, Sudbury’s health unit reports

Sudbury Public Health reports 102 local drug deaths from Jan.-Oct., down from the year prior. Officials warn the toll remains high and urge more harm reduction.

Overdose deaths in the region declined in 2025 compared to a year earlier, according to data from Public Health Sudbury and District’s community drug strategy on drug toxicity.

“The local data suggests that from January 2025 to October 2025, there have been 102 drug-related deaths,” said Danielle Labrosse, a health promoter with the health unit.

“In comparison to the same period (in) 2024, in January to October, we saw 117 people who died from a suspected drug poisoning.”

While fatal overdoses have declined, Labrosse said the situation is still critical.

“In the last two years, we have begun to see a decrease in the incidence of death,” she said.

“As we can see from the pre-2020 period, we still have a long way to go.”

Provincial responsibility

France Gélinas, Nickel Belt MPP and the NDP’s health critic, said health care is the No. 1 responsibility of the provincial government.

“And right now they are failing,” Gélinas said.

“They failed 102 people in the first 10 months of this year, and they fail … an average of two people every single week in our community.”

Kaela Pelland, manager of education and engagement with Réseau ACCESS Network, said the number of people dying from overdoses is still far too high.

“The number of lives lost remains significantly higher than pre-pandemic levels and continues to represent profound harm to our community,” Pelland said.

“Mortality data tells us who is dying -- it does not tell us how many are suffering, nor how preventable that suffering truly is.”

“The numbers are still way too high,” Gélinas said.

“Am I happy it’s going down? Yes, but it’s still way too high. We have at least two people every single week die in our community of preventable deaths.”

People, not statistics

Labrosse said the human impact of the crisis is still significant.

“I think it’s important to recognize that each number does represent a human being and their friends and their family and loved ones,” she said.

Gélinas said it’s key to make mental health and addiction services more widely available.

“We have the professionals,” she said.

“When you have community mental health associations and community mental health providers that haven’t seen a base budget increase in 12 years, they cannot recruit and retain a stable workforce.”

“It’s happening everywhere in Ontario, but it’s happening in northern Ontario at a rate that is twice or three times how it’s happening in the rest of Ontario,” she added.

“When somebody is sick, when somebody has a mental illness, when somebody uses substances, they are sick, they need care. They don’t need discrimination. They don’t need to be put aside.”