April 19, 2019.
According to the latest figures from the French Observatory for Drugs and Drug Addiction, while drug use is declining among young people, it is increasing among adults, especially between 26 and 54 years old.
Drug use decreases among young people under 25
Who are these French people who use drugs? Illicit substances such as cannabis, cocaine or heroin, but also licit such as tobacco and alcohol, which are the two leading causes of preventable death in France, causing one in five deaths. The French Observatory for Drugs and Drug Addiction (ODFT) has just published its latest report on drugs and addictions in France, and the figures for 2017 are very worrying: while the trend in drug use is on the decline among young people, it seems that adults, on the contrary, are taking drugs more and more.
Drug consumption among young people seems to continue to decline, especially for alcohol and tobacco. The shock campaigns and the constant rise in the price of a packet of cigarettes as well as the electronic cigarette have certainly something to do with it. If the proportion of those who have never drunk has almost tripled in fifteen years (14% in 2017), the figures remain worrying: at 17 years old, ” out of ten young people, nine have already drunk alcohol, six have tried cigarettes and four have experimented with cannabis. Only a minority of young people have not taken any of these three substances (12%) “. One in four 17-year-olds even smoke cigarettes daily.
It should also be noted that at 17 years old, 7.4% of young people are at high risk of problematic cannabis use.
Adults are taking drugs more and more
Among adults, the licit substances that are tobacco and alcohol are the most consumed products, but we can see a decrease in their consumption since the year 2000. Today, one in four adults aged 18 to 75 (27%) would be affected by daily smoking and one in 10 (10%) would drink alcohol every day.
On the other hand, the authors of the report note a increase in cannabis consumption, particularly high in France compared to other European countries: the number of adults reporting regular use has indeed doubled. The authors report “ 45% of experimenters among adults, 11% of users during the year and 6% in the last month “. According to them, this translates “ both the aging of the generations having experienced this product during its period of strong diffusion (from the 1990s) and the slowing down of initiations to cannabis among the youngest “.
Finally, a worrying information: there are more and more kinds of drugs in circulation, in Europe as in France, and ” user practices remain marked by polyconsumption “, Note the authors of the report. ” The last few years have been marked by increased access to illicit products (by post or by home deliveries, via social networks, etc.) “.
Aurélie Giraud
Read also: Everything you need to know about addictology
