Regular consumption of tobacco, alcohol and cannabis increased among college students in 2013. And they add up.
Tobacco, alcohol, cannabis, the mixture does not seem to scare the students! The 8th barometer on the health of French students aged 18 to 25 (1) carried out by the EmeVia student mutuals with the CSA Institute paints a worrying portrait of multiple consumers of these substances harmful to their health.
Indeed, according to the survey, 86.7% of regular cannabis users are also occasional or daily tobacco smokers, and 58.2% excessive alcohol drinkers. Another alarming finding is that young people seem to be settling into regular consumption of all these products.
The study finds that alcohol consumption among college students is on the rise. In 2013, 39.5% of them declared having consumed alcohol 2 to 4 times a month, compared to 36.3% in 2011. In total, 66.7% declared themselves to be drinkers in 2013 while ‘they were 59.7% in 2011. However, slightly fewer students drink excessively.
In addition, the proportion of students who smoke regularly (that is to say those who smoke every day) is also increasing (14.2%, +0.7 pt since 2011). The influence of friends is considerable. Eight out of ten smokers have lit their first cigarette to participate in moments of conviviality or to do like the others.
Finally, the number of students declaring not to have smoked in the past year is decreasing. At the same time, there is an increase in the frequency of consumption by regular consumers (3% compared to 2% in 2011).
For Cédric Chevalier, President of EmeVia, “the results (…) confirms the need to strengthen our prevention actions on the issues of alcohol and tobacco. The increase in certain consumption alerts us to the need to continue our efforts, in partnership with the various public and private players ”.
Last note, there has been a sharp decrease in the consumption of poppers since 2011, thanks to the legislation prohibiting the sale of this psychoactive substance, 6.9% in 2011 against 3.9% in 2013. ” EmeVia has been able to alert the public authorities to the significant consumption of poppers in recent years. We can only see the positive effect of our alert two years after our last investigation “, declares Benjamin Chkroun, General Delegate of emeVia. However, the Council of State has just canceled the ban on the sale of these substances
(1) 6,134 students randomly selected by each student mutual organization participating in the survey responded to a questionnaire sent by post.
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