Cost of Injury in Canada Costs by cause of injury

Total, per capita and per outcome costs by cause of injury, 2018

Cost by injury cause

Falls had a higher total cost than any other cause in 2018, accounting for $10.3 billion and 35 per cent of the total cost of injury. Transport incidents had a total cost of $3.6 billion, suicide/self-harm a total cost of $2.9 billion and unintentional poisoning, $2.6 billion.

Fall-related injuries accounted for 45 per cent of all direct costs, or $9.1 billion. Indirect costs were highest for suicide/self-harm ($2.4 billion), unintentional poisoning ($2.1 billion) and transport incidents ($1.4 billion).

Cost by injury outcome

Deaths due to suicide/self-harm and unintentional poisoning contributed the most to the cost of injury deaths in 2018; these two causes combined accounted for two-thirds of the cost. Falls accounted for the highest cost across all other injury outcomes.

Violence had the highest cost per death, followed by suicide/self-harm and drowning. Injuries from fire/burns, drowning and transport incidents had the highest cost per hospitalization. Drowning injuries had the highest cost per ED visit.

Direct and indirect costs

Injuries cost each person in Canada $792 in 2018. Of that, $551 per person went to health-care system costs due to injury. Fall injuries led to the highest total and direct per-capita costs. Suicide and self-harm had the highest cost per capita for indirect costs.