‘It doesn’t discriminate’: Majority of Sudbury overdose deaths occurring behind closed doors

A report from Public Health Sudbury and Districts shows that most fatal drug poisonings in the region are happening inside people’s homes — not downtown, in encampments or in public spaces.

From 2022 to 2025, 76 per cent of suspected and confirmed drug poisoning deaths occurred in private residences, and 80 per cent of the people who died were living in private dwellings, according to data from the Office of the Chief Coroner.  

Dr. Mustafa Hirji, CEO of Public Health Sudbury and Districts and co-chair of the community drug strategy with the city of Greater Sudbury, said the numbers confirm what front-line workers have known for years.

“Most people who overdose are overdosing in their homes,” Hirji said. “They’re often people who are going about their life, holding a job, having a family, but struggling with this addiction.”  

He said public attention often focuses on visible homelessness and drug use downtown, but the data shows a far broader crisis.

From 2022 to 2025, suspected drug poisoning deaths reached:

“This is a much more complicated problem than what we might see every day throughout the community,” Hirji said.  

For people with lived experience, the trend toward private residences is not surprising.

Alyshia Fenerty, a Sudbury woman in recovery from drugs and alcohol, said addiction often drives people indoors, behind closed doors and away from anyone who might intervene.

“Addiction is a very isolating disease,” Fenerty said. “You’re sitting at home using by yourself… your addiction wants you isolated. It’s trying to kill you.”  

Fenerty said many people assume drug use happens “out partying” or in public, but she described years of using secretly while maintaining housing and, at times, work.

“You could be sitting beside someone that uses fentanyl daily. You wouldn’t know it because they can function through it,” she said.  

Her mother died in 2017 from alcoholism, and her brother died in 2020 at age 40 after years of opioid use that’s suspected to have potentially worsened an existing heart condition, leading to his death. 

She said her first drug of choice became fentanyl because it numbed the grief she “didn’t know how to cope with.” 

Over time, she moved onto using crack, crystal meth, and even carfentanil daily during her most severe period of addiction.

Fenerty said stigma pushes people deeper into hiding.

“You don’t want to lose your job, your kids… so you keep it a secret and you keep it behind closed doors,” she said.  

Fenerty has also witnessed overdoses firsthand, including the death of a neighbour in her 20s.

“I tried to wake her up and I couldn’t… Fifteen minutes later she was gone,” she said. “It was heartbreaking.”  

Fenerty is now focused on rebuilding her recovery after a recent relapse, which followed a year and a half of sobriety. This relapse has led to an ongoing child custody case with the Children’s Aid Society but she’s working towards regaining custody.

“My whole life I had mind altering substances in my body… I was looking back at all the things I had done and the messes I had made and the hurt that I caused people. I apologized to my dad and I said, ‘I’m sorry that I took your daughter away from you. I took your grandkids away from you.”

At Health Sciences North, emergency physician Dr. Dominique Ansell said overdoses now present with increasing complexity because people often don’t know what substances they have taken.

“We’re flying blind a little bit,” she said. “We don’t know exactly what drug has been taken… our patients might not know what was in it anyways.”  

She said tranquilizers and other non-opioid substances are making overdoses harder to treat, and naloxone — a drug that can reverse overdoses — doesn’t always work.

Ansell sees an average of three to four overdose-related presentations every eight- to 10-hour shift.  

She said overdose patients come from all backgrounds.

“It could be anyone from a middle-age woman, man, any walk of life,