Copyright: 2005 The Leader-Post Ltd.
Contact: letters@leaderpost.canwest.com
Website: http://www.canada.com/regina/leaderpost/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/361
Author: Jack Aubry, CanWest News Service
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mjcn.htm (Cannabis - Canada)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/youth.htm (Youth)

TEENS SAY POT EASY TO GET

OTTAWA -- Marijuana is perceived as easier to access than cigarettes on
Canadian school grounds, a newly released government report on teenagers shows.

Commissioned by Health Canada, the report was prepared for the department's
effort in developing coping and refusal skills among teenagers. It said the
easier access to marijuana is ironically due to the legal age limit for
smoking cigarettes and the fact that you have to buy cigarettes through
traditional outlets, such as corner stores.

Based on focus groups held across the country, it also states that
marijuana is perceived among Canadian teens to be less harmful to those who
use it, compared to cigarettes, because of the effective messages that
participants have been exposed to on the health effects of cigarettes and
second-hand smoke relative to those of marijuana.

"Participants generally felt that the only exposure they had received on
issues dealing with marijuana were communications on the legalization of
the substance or the use of marijuana for medicinal purposes," said the report.

It said the teens in the focus groups had a genuine sense that those who
were marijuana smokers do not know the adverse effects of the substance
"aside from killing brain cells or making 'users' lazy" and do not
understand the health reasons why they should stop smoking it.

The report is being released as the federal government promises to move on
legislation before the House of Commons that will decriminalize marijuana,
as well as a companion bill that will stop people from driving while on drugs.

A poll released in November found Canadians are smoking marijuana more than
ever before and that almost 30 per cent of 15- to 17-year-olds and 47 per
cent of 18- and 19 -year-olds had used marijuana in the last year.

Prepared by Millward Brown Goldfarb, the report is based on research from
16 focus groups held earlier this year in Toronto, Montreal, Regina and
Halifax. The groups were divided into three age categories -- 10-12, 13-15
and 16-19 -- in each location, with the oldest group also being divided up
between smokers and non-smokers.

Paul Dufresne, a spokesman for Health Canada, said the department is
following the $56,000 report's recommendation to create separate messages
regarding smoking tobacco and marijuana "because teens perceive them as two
different things."

"Having separate messages would, in participants' minds, ensure that the
key messages being communicated would not be missed or ignored," concluded
the report.

Dufresne said as part of the department's information campaign on
marijuana, it would soon be releasing an information booklet for parents
identifying signs that a child is smoking marijuana.