Underage females on Ibiza drink alcohol and smoke more than males

67.3% of girls between 12 and 18 years of age on Ibiza have drunk alcohol, compared to 58.4%, while 36.8% of them have smoked tobacco, eight points more than in the case of boys. The difference between both sexes is much smaller in cannabis, which has been tried by 24.3% of female minors, 1.9 points higher than boys of the same age.

At the presentation of the study, the director of Cepca, Belén Alvite, warned of the ease with which young people find acquiring these substances, especially alcohol and tobacco. Despite the fact that their sale is forbidden to minors, half of those who smoke buy the packets without problems in tobacconists, bars and gas stations.

In the case of alcohol, 35.1% acquires it in supermarkets, bars or gas stations, while 34.5% can drink thanks to the purchase of the products by another person. The facilitator of drinking for adolescents is both older (26.3%) and younger (18.2%).

In the case of tobacco users, 42.7% of their parents know that their children smoke, but only 22.8% authorize it.

Entrenched alcohol use

Permissiveness is much greater with alcohol, since 51.9% of adolescents who drink occasionally say that they have family authorization, and 67.5% of their parents are aware of this habit.

Regarding cannabis, 42.4% of consumers reveal that their parents know that they smoke joints, and 22.7% even say that they do not oppose it. Forty-eight percent of them want to continue smoking, while 30.5% plan to reduce their consumption and 13.4% to quit. Some 8.1% have tried to quit but have not been able to, while 1.1% of adolescents who drink occasionally have tried to give up alcohol without success. On the other hand, 69.6% want to continue drinking and 29.3% plan to reduce consumption or quit.

With tobacco, 39.2% plan to reduce their consumption, 24.6% will try to quit and 26% will continue smoking without hesitation. Another 10.2% have already tried to quit, but still continue to smoke cigarettes.

Medications

Although the rest of narcotic substances are still very much in the minority in these age groups, Alvite warned of the increase in the legal consumption of prescription drugs, such as benzodiazepines [anxiolytics and tranquilizers]. 4.3% of adolescents have mixed these pills with alcohol to get high, compared to 2.7% in 2018, and they buy them on the street or steal them from family medicine cabinets -Spain leads the world in the consumption of these drugs-.