Over the past five years, the number of homeless people who die annually in Edmonton has increased dramatically — from 37 in 2019 to 302 in 2023, according to data provided by Alberta Justice. In Calgary, that number has risen from 51 to 294 in the same time period. A talented football player, Jonasson was also kind and stood up for other kids who were being bullied.
Jonasson died on Sept. 28, 2023, after overdosing in the Herb Jamieson Centre — a central Edmonton shelter.Lisa Meyer and her brother Chris Jonasson as adults , and as children . Jonasson was living on Edmonton streets when he died in September 2023. "Our thoughts are with Albertans who have lost loved ones while experiencing homelessness/no fixed address," the justice ministry said in a statement.
Lisa Meyer sits with her brother Chris Jonasson and their mother Marilyn Jonasson, in a photo taken in the 2000s. Jonasson died in 2023, and Meyer says she believes treatment and support for people dealing with addiction and homelessness is still too hard to access. "Somebody loves them and somebody's heart is broken when they die. And I couldn't help Chris when he was alive. So I just … I want to do whatever I can now.
He said that while the opioid crisis has been ongoing for some time, an increasingly contaminated street drug supply has accelerated overdoses and deaths.Barr says overburdened hospitals are discharging people with significant mental and physical health issues into homelessness, which can result in worse outcomes.
"No level of government and no political party has done enough to actually make a substantial dent in the number of people who are suffering with homelessness," he said.As homeless encampments have spread to all corners of Edmonton, so too have the deaths. The agency, which offers support services to people who are homeless, began trying to keep track of clients' deaths when the numbers started to climb during the pandemic.Many of the death notifications have come from Edmonton police, which also started providing location data in 2023, allowing Gajda to begin building a map showing where deaths happen.