Provincial and territorial coroners and medical examiners (C/ME) investigate and classify deaths that are unexpected, unexplained, suspected to have occurred by violence or believed to be from injury or drugs. From 2006 to 2023, 14.0% of all deaths in Canada were investigated by a C/ME. The territories (40.6%) had the highest percentage of deaths investigated while Quebec (7.6%) had the lowest. The variation by province and territory may be explained in part by differences in legislation outlining the provincial and territorial death investigation service requirement for investigating deaths. New preliminary information on investigated deaths is available today from the Canadian Coroner and Medical Examiner Database.
Note to readers
The Canadian Coroner and Medical Examiner Database (CCMED) was developed in 2008 at Statistics Canada in collaboration with the 13 provincial and territorial Chief Coroners and Chief Medical Examiners and the Public Health Agency of Canada. Currently, the CCMED combines investigated death data from all provincial and territorial databases, except for Manitoba. The database contains detailed information on demographics (e.g., age, sex, date of death, province/territory), causes and manner of death, related health conditions, and circumstances of death.
The Canadian Vital Statistics – Death Database (CVSD) includes information on all deaths reported to Statistics Canada by the provincial and territorial vital statistics offices.
The ratio of investigated deaths was calculated by dividing the number of investigated deaths in the CCMED by the total number of deaths for a given sex, age group or province/territory in the CVSD for a given year. The percentage of investigated deaths was obtained by multiplying this ratio by 100.
The total number of fentanyl-related toxicity deaths was obtained by counting the total number of deaths in the CCMED where fentanyl or fentanyl analogues were included in the cause of death statement or identified as having contributed to the death. It is possible for a province or territory to not list specific drugs in the cause of death statement. For this reason, the number of fentanyl-related deaths may be underestimated.
Medical assistance in dying was legalized in Canada in June 2016.
The average number of deaths investigated by coroners and medical examiners (C/MEs) per year is based on data available from 2006 to 2023, which is the period with maximal data coverage. Data for 2024 deaths have been suppressed from the analysis owing to the high numbers of open and ongoing investigations. All data are considered preliminary and include only closed cases. Closed cases refer to completed death investigations (i.e., cause and manner of death are final). Open cases refer to ongoing investigations (i.e., cause and manner of death are pending or preliminary). The percentages of open cases in the CCMED are higher in recent years (5.3% in 2022 and 12.9% in 2023). These percentages decrease as investigations are finalized. For this reason, data for recent years should be interpreted with caution.
Data for some provinces and territories were excluded from this release as counts are incomplete and do not reflect what is included in their respective jurisdictional databases. For the provinces and territories included in the release, data are not available for all years. Data for Alberta, British Columbia, Newfoundland and Labrador, Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Quebec, Saskatchewan and Northwest Territories are available from 2006 to 2023. Data for New Brunswick are available from 2006 to 2020 and 2023. Data for Nova Scotia are available from 2010 to 2023. Data for Nunavut are available from 2010 to 2013 and from 2019 to 2022. Data for Yukon are available for 2006 to 2016 and 2018 to 2021.
Since the source of completeness of the available information varies between jurisdictions, users are advised to exercise caution when comparing data between years and across provinces and territories.
Select jurisdictions investigate stillbirths as per their province/territory legislation. Stillbirths are included in the calculation of the overall proportion of deaths investigated by a C/ME as well as in the calculation of the provincial/territorial totals but are excluded from the calculation of statistics related to age or sex.
Counts referenced in this release were rounded to a neighbouring multiple of five.
Contact information
------For more information, contact the Statistical Information Service (toll-free 1-800-263-1136; 514-283-8300; infostats@statcan.gc.ca) or Media Relations (statcan.mediahotline-ligneinfomedias.statcan@statcan.gc.ca).