A 12-year-old boy, found unconscious and emaciated in a puddle before dying in hospital. Brothers, forced to sleep in a mesh tent, zip-tied to their clothes. Audio recordings and text messages from would-be adoptive parents, calling the kids "f–kface," "loser" and "dumb brat."

Chilling details have come to light in the trial of Becky Hamber and Brandy Cooney. The Burlington, Ont., couple have been charged with abusing two Indigenous brothers they were in the process of adopting and murdering the older boy, known only as L.L., who died on Dec. 21, 2022. They have pleaded not guilty to all charges.

“Sometimes when we see the headlines, we focus on the offenders’ behaviour as being so reprehensible,” said Cindy Blackstock, an Ottawa-based First Nations child advocate.

“But what we need to do is knit together these cases to see the patterns.”

There have been several high-profile cases across Canada of children dying while being followed by the youth protection system, meaning a child welfare system has received reports about the child’s safety in the past, or has previously interacted with the child and the family.

But we don’t have an official count of them across Canada — and each jurisdiction has a different way of monitoring these deaths.

CBC News reached out to every province and territory to ask if and how they track those numbers. Every province that responded said it does — but some, like Ontario, Quebec, P.E.I. and Nunavut, would not share the number of deaths in 2025. P.E.I. and Nunavut said releasing the information could mean identifying people, due to their small number of child and youth deaths. Quebec’s coroner’s office said it doesn't yet have a comprehensive picture of last year's figures. Ontario didn't answer questions about why it wasn't publicizing its 2025 data.

The Northwest Territories and Yukon did not respond to CBC's inquiries by deadline.