Chief Medical Examiner says cocaine deaths have more than doubled in NL

Between 2023-2024, this average has more than doubled, with an annual average of 36 deaths attributed solely to cocaine.

Cocaine is now the number one killer in drug overdose deaths in this province. At a RCMP news conference in St. John’s this morning, police say recent seizures have also shown current street level cocaine is of an extremely high potency.  Out of a total of 158 overdose deaths between 2023-2024, 87% were accidental deaths. 49% of these deaths involved cocaine alone while 18 % of these deaths involved fentanyl and/or analogs of fentanyl alone. Chief Medical Examiner Dr. Nash Denic, says the number of deaths where cocaine has been implicated has steadily risen since 2021 with sharp increases recently. There were 84 deaths in 2024 related to substance use, and while the vast majority  includes accidental deaths, many individuals are intentionally using the drugs for euphoria.  

Denic says of the deaths last year, 43 of them were related to the use of cocaine. He says in 1999, there was only one cocaine related death in the province and recent deaths are due to counterfeit drugs xanax or dilaudid. He says these people are younger than 20 and some are even children. Denic says these are gut wrenching incidents and drugs on the market can’t be trusted. 

RCMP Inspector David Emberley says recent testing of cocaine seized showed purity levels never seen before. He says up until 2-3 years ago, cocaine was tested at 15-20 percent pure and cocaine seized now is well above 90 percent. From 2018-2022, the province had an annual average of 14 toxicity deaths attributed solely to cocaine. Between 2023-2024, this average has more than doubled, with an annual average of 36 deaths attributed solely to cocaine.