The province's attorney general says B.C. can now proceed 91ÂãÁÄÊÓƵ” on behalf of federal, provincial and territorial governments 91ÂãÁÄÊÓƵ” to recover the costs of treating opioid-related diseases that were allegedly caused by the industry91ÂãÁÄÊÓƵ™s wrongful conduct.

Attorney General Niki Sharma released a statement Wednesday (Jan. 22), following the B.C. Supreme Court's decision to certify the province's class-action lawsuit against opioid manufacturers and distributors. 

Sharma added the court's decision reaffirms the province's commitment to holding pharmaceutical companies accountable for their role in the opioid crisis, which was declared as a public health emergency in B.C. in 2016.

At least 16,000 people in B.C. have died as a result of unregulated drugs since 2016. The province hasn't released updated drug-related death data since December 2024, when the BC Coroners Service reported at least 1,925 people died of toxic drugs in the first 10 months of that year.

91ÂãÁÄÊÓƵœIn 2018, British Columbia took the unprecedented step of launching a class-action lawsuit on behalf of all jurisdictions in Canada and enacted the Opioid Damages and Health Care Costs Recovery Act," Sharma said. 

"Our goal was clear: to recover the health-care costs of treating opioid-related harms and to hold manufacturers and distributors accountable for their role in allegedly using deceptive marketing practices to drive sales, contributing to addiction and overdose rates in the country."

In the class-action lawsuit, B.C. alleged every province and territory in Canada has experience high numbers of addictions, illnesses and deaths due to an opioid epidemic, and the defendants contributed to that epidemic by falsely marketing their products as being less addictive and less prone to abuse than other pain medications. 

The court had already affirmed the constitutionality of a law allowing B.C. to pursue a class-action lawsuit on behalf of other Canadian governments last November. That's after several opioid companies argued in B.C. Supreme Court that the province was overstepping its authority under the constitution.

A majority of the top court found that B.C.'s law respects the legislative authority of other Canadian governments, which can choose to opt out of the proceeding, and the decision noted nearly every province and territory as well as the federal government intended to take part in the class-action.

91ÂãÁÄÊÓƵ“ With files from The Canadian Press