First Nations 'triaging grief' as opioids claim lives at more than 8 times the rate of the rest of Alberta

First Nations people in Alberta have been dying from opioids at more than eight times the rate of the rest of the population, according to newly published data that puts harder numbers on a grim reality Indigenous leaders have been sounding the alarm over for years.

Jody Plaineagle says it's hard to put into words the cascading effects the opioid crisis has had on people in communities like hers.

"You lose someone and you're trying to grieve and then somebody else dies," she said.

"You're triaging your grief and loss."

Plaineagle is a member of the Piikani Nation in southern Alberta — a region that has been hit especially hard by the opioid crisis, according to a recently published report with long-awaited data focused on the province's First Nations.

The report shows a surge in deaths among First Nations people, with 373 unintentional opioid poisonings in 2021 and 344 in 2022.

That works out to more than 200 deaths per 100,000 people each year, which is more than eight times the rate among the rest of the Alberta population.

The numbers provide two more full years of data than was previously available but still present a picture nearly two years out of date.

As the crisis has continued to play out in recent months, Indigenous communities have signalled the scale of the challenges they're facing.

In April 2023, the Blood Tribe in southern Alberta declared a state of emergency due to opioids, in part targeting drug traffickers. The Confederacy of Treaty 6 First Nations declared an emergency a few months later.

In January of this year, the Piikani Nation also declared a state of emergency. In a letter to Piikani citizens, the nation's chief and council wrote that though the situation facing the community wasn't unique to Piikani, the impact has been tragic.

"We all the know the deaths caused and the lives destroyed by these drugs and the criminals who peddle them. Each life lost breaks our collective hearts. This cannot be allowed to continue," the letter reads.

Plaineagle says many people in her community barely have time to process one death before another occurs.

She says there are sometimes "chain reaction" deaths within families, when one person dies of an overdose and, in their grief, other family members die of opioids or other causes related to mental health.