Wastewater survey finds different drug-use patterns across Canadian cities
Statistics Canada’s latest wastewater release shows differing fentanyl and stimulant patterns across eight cities, including Montréal, while warning that the estimates carry substantial uncertainty.
A new Statistics Canada wastewater release shows markedly different patterns in selected opioid and stimulant indicators across eight Canadian cities, including Montréal.
Across reporting cities, measured methamphetamine levels increased 17.1% from 2024 to 2025 and the cocaine metabolite benzoylecgonine rose 7.1%. The fentanyl metabolite norfentanyl decreased 42.3% on average, with Metro Vancouver recording the highest but declining levels over the January 2024 to March 2026 period.
The participating sites cover about 9.2 million people. Statistics Canada cautions that collection, laboratory analysis, temporary population changes and per-capita calculations introduce uncertainty, so city results should be interpreted as relative patterns rather than precise consumption totals.
Source: Statistics Canada, Canadian Wastewater Survey release, published September 22, 2026.
Illustrative stock photo: Patrick Federi via Unsplash, under the Unsplash License. Resized; not a photograph of the sampling program or reported period.
AI-assisted news brief. Sources are linked above.
How we work