Life expectancy has been steadily rising in Canada for years but the country’s chief public health officer says in a just released report, ”alarmingly” this is expected to change.

(Public Health Agency of Canada/Canadian Press)

While there’s no data on how life expectancy’s been affected nationally, Dr. Theresa Tam says B.C. and Alberta have ”historically” been hardest hit by the opioid crisis and that other parts of Canada have recently seen increasing numbers of deaths.

She adds the Public Health Agency of Canada is ”analyzing the impact of the opioid crisis on overall life expectancy” to get a national snapshot.

Tam says nearly 4,000 Canadians died from opioid overdoses last year alone, which is equivalent to 11 deaths every day.