Pubdate: Mon, 10 Jan 2005
Source: Regina Leader-Post (CN SN)

Copyright: 2005 The Leader-Post Ltd.
Contact:  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.
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MAP posted-by: Jackl