Chief pledges to banish drug dealers as Fort Chipewyan grapples with suicide crisis

An illicit supply of drugs in Fort Chipewyan is contributing to a suicide crisis in the remote northern Alberta community, says the chief of the Mikisew Cree First Nation.

The band declared a state of local emergency this week, raising the alarm over a string of recent deaths by suicide, and numerous suicide attempts, in the isolated hamlet of about 800 people, 220 kilometres north of Fort McMurray.

Chief Billy-Joe Tuccaro said at least five band members have died by suicide in the past couple of months. 

Ten others have attempted to take their lives in the past week, he said.

"We have to do this," Tuccaro said in an interview Wednesday from Fort Chipewyan.

"We cannot sit by and pretend it's not happening."

As the band calls for additional provincial and federal help, residents of the hamlet say a co-ordinated response will be needed to address complex social issues — including isolation, intergenerational trauma and addiction — that are contributing to the crisis.

Tuccaro said the tragedy is being fed by the desperation of substance abuse, and the ebb and flow of the illicit drug supply. 

"As the chief, I get a lot of these calls from people reaching out and I have to that ear for them," he said.

"A lot of my people, they get high off the crack and the meth. And it's the comedown that's doing it do them. I truly believe that is the root of the problem."

Tuccaro said if the community wants to ease the mental health crisis in the long term, it must stem the flow of illegal drugs and banish dealers from the community.

"We are, 100 per cent, going after the drug dealers. Enough is enough," he said.

"As the Mikisew people, we know a lot of this is happening in our homes."

The MCFN has taken a hard stance against street drugs. In February, the band adopted a zero-tolerance policy against the possession, manufacturing and trafficking of illegal drugs.