From this week’s Galway City Tribune – More than a quarter of teens in the city have been ‘drunk in the last month’, while vaping has overtaken smoking as the more common vice in young people according to a new survey.

These statistics were revealed by Planet Youth this week, an initiative of the Western Region Drug and Alcohol Task Force, which surveyed 754 15- and 16-year-olds in 11 schools as part of a citywide study.

The results showed that 26% of respondents in the age category had been drunk in the previous month; 18% of city teens do their drinking in a friend’s home; and 16% of them reported being drunk by the age of 14.

Some 11% of those who were drinking alcohol had got it from a parent, while a further 7% had secured it from a friend’s parent. Results showed that those whose parents disapproved of drinking were almost three-times less likely to get drunk.

When it came to the use of illegal drugs, 16% of post-Junior Cert students said they had tried cannabis.

Of more than 750 respondents, 16% were daily vapers versus 6% who said they were daily smokers.
This is a shortened preview version of this story. To read the rest of the article, see the May 26 edition of the Galway City Tribune. You can support our journalism and buy a digital edition HERE.