कैनबिस यूरोपीय दवाओं की खपत का नेतृत्व करता है

The online survey was conducted by the European Union Drugs Agency (EUDA) with adults from 31 European countries about drug use, revealing that marijuana continues to be the most consumed illicit drug, with 59% of respondents indicating its use in the last year, followed by MDMA/Ecstasy (30%) and cocaine (29%).

The survey by the agency that replaced the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction (EMCDDA), based in Lisbon, also highlights the use of other drugs with 18% mentioning the consumption in the last year of magic mushrooms, 17% of amphetamine and 16% of new psychoactive substances (NPS), while 14% of respondents reported the consumption of ketamine (an anaesthetic used in veterinary medicine for large animals).

The document, which shows the current drug use habits of more than 66,000 Europeans, states that polydrug use is increasingly widespread, noting that for many users “one drug is not enough”.

“In both regions [24 Member States of the European Union (EU-24) and Norway], the most common pattern of drug use reported through the survey was polysubstance use, the use of two or more psychoactive substances (legal or illegal) simultaneously or sequentially,” the document highlights, adding that respondents from the EU-24 and Norway indicated that powder cocaine was the drug they most frequently used with at least one other substance, including alcohol or tobacco.

According to the report, only 4% of participants said they had used cocaine alone during their last use, while “marijuana users had the lowest rate of polysubstance use, with one-third reporting that they had used only that substance the last time they used it.”

According to the research, which took place between May and July 2024, marijuana is “the most consumed substance, while polysubstance use is increasingly widespread”.

For this EUDA online survey, 61,732 citizens from the EU-24 and Norway and 4,442 from the Western Balkans (Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia and Serbia) were interviewed.

In the Western Balkans, respondents cited powder cocaine and crack cocaine as the drugs they had most frequently used with at least one other substance, including alcohol or tobacco use, with only 3% saying they had used one of these drugs exclusively during their last use.

When asked about “motivations for drug use — understanding the ‘why’”, over 75% of respondents from the EU-24 and Norway reported having used MDMA/ecstasy, ketamine and/or powder cocaine “for fun”, the same reason being cited by over half of those who used New Psychoactive Substances (NPS), amphetamine, crack cocaine and/or methamphetamine.

The data also shows that 51% of those who used amphetamines and 44% of those who used methamphetamine said they used them “to stay awake”, while another 60% said they used methamphetamine, cannabis and/or low-THC cannabis (CBD) “to reduce stress” or “to relax”.

The majority of respondents in the Western Balkans stated that they had used MDMA/Ecstasy powder cocaine, amphetamine, ketamine and/or crack cocaine “for fun”.