Through 2021, red alerts (when ambulance capacity is maxed out) broke records while 911 dispatchers began hanging up on people with less urgent emergency calls to ensure bandwidth for the most serious calls. It turns out, unregulated drug poisoning may have driven this crisis to a degree not previously discussed in media.
Data obtained through a Freedom of Information request and reported in February 2022 by CBC's Rob Easton revealed the extent of the ambulance crisis experienced in Calgary and Edmonton through 2020 and 2021. July 2021, incidentally the first month of the Alberta government's ill-fated "Best Summer Ever," coincided with record-setting EMS dispatches for drug poisoning.