by Randy Bennett
Parents have been identified as the main source of illegal drugs and alcohol for primary school children.
This was one of the findings of the National Council of Substance Abuse’s (NCSA) National Primary School Survey 2020 entitled: Drug Use and Related Issues Among
the Primary School.
Releasing the findings this afternoon, research assistant at the NCSA and survey coordinator Laura Foster revealed that drug use at the primary school level remained minimal and was primarily experimental.
Foster pointed out that children in Classes 3 and 4 took part in the survey with the average age being 10 years old.She said the age of first use was generally between seven and eight years old, it was expected due to the young age of participants.
Males represented 50.7 per cent of participants in the survey and females 49.1 per cent.
Participants were quizzed about their use of tobacco cigarettes, marijuana, alcohol, energy drinks, fanta, inhalants, lean and vaping.She said the results of the survey – the third of its kind following similar surveys in 2006 and 2009 – showed prevalence rates had generally decreased since 2009.
Foster indicated that there were slight decreases in the number of primary school children using tobacco cigarettes, alcohol and marijuana, while there was a minor increase in those using Fanta.
It was revealed that alcohol and energy drinks were the preferred substances of choice for primary school children.
However, the survey showed that parents were proving to be the main sources of marijuana and alcohol, while the home was also identified as the most common location.
“In our full report we broke the family category down into parents, siblings and other relatives. When we did this, what we found was that parents were actually the most common family source for drugs such as marijuana, alcohol, energy drinks and inhalants, while other relatives were the main source in terms of tobacco cigarettes and Fanta,” Foster said.
“In terms of location of use across the board, we found that it was the home for all substances. That was the top location and this stands to reason that family was one of the most common sources for drugs and also the young age of our participants as they are quite likely spending much of their out-of-school time at home or in its close environs.”
Interestingly, the survey also revealed that young children who play video games and frequently use social media were more likely to use the substances.
“In terms of tobacco and marijuana, there was evidence of a strong association. So for tobacco cigarettes, persons who had used social media during the week leading up to the survey were more than four times more likely to report lifetime use of this substance and for marijuana such persons were just about three times more likely to report lifetime use,” Foster pointed out.
Among the NSCA’s short-term recommendations was for drug prevention education to be increased for primary school students of all ages; for efforts to be made to ensure the delivery of drug prevention education module within HFLE (Health and Family Life Education) curriculum and for drug prevention efforts to include energy drinks, Fanta, e-cigarettes and lean.
The body’s long-term recommendations call for further efforts to be made to further restrict children’s access to drugs and for drug prevention education to be delivered using a national approach coordinated by the NCSA.
randybennett@barbadostoday.bb
