Illegal drug use on rise in Finland: Survey

Experimentation with illegal drugs and drug use have continued to increase in Finland, according to a population survey conducted by the Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare (THL).

The survey conducted in the autumn of 2022 showed that about 30 percent of the adult population have tried an illegal drug in their lifetimes – most commonly, cannabis, said THL in a press release on Wednesday.

The proportion of those who have tried cannabis has increased fivefold from six percent in 1992 to 29 percent in 2022.

Experimentation with other drugs has also increased, although the numbers are much lower than for those who have used cannabis.

Seven percent of the population said that they had tried amphetamine at some time in their lives, with six percent reporting having used ecstasy, while five percent had used cocaine.

The use of sports doping drugs has remained unchanged. One percent of the population have used them at some time in their lives.

Drug use is usually limited to experimental use once, twice, or a few times, while many have stopped using a long time ago. It is hardly surprising that increasing numbers of people aged 15–69 have tried drugs at some point in their lives.

“The surveys targeted people who were between the ages of 15 and 69 at the time that the material for each survey was collected. The older age groups with fewer drug-related experiences gradually drop out of the sample of the survey”, said Karoliina Karjalainen, a senior researcher of THL.

This means that an increasing proportion of the target group are those who were young in the 1990s or thereafter, when use of illegal drugs began to become more common in Finland.

“From a previous survey we know that a significant portion of age groups born in the 1980s and 1990s have tried drugs. Against this background, the increase in the proportion of the population who have used drugs was largely an expected result”, Karjalainen observed.

Especially the perceptions of risk related to cannabis have eased. The survey showed that 57 percent felt that trying cannabis once or twice poses only a low risk to health, or other potential harm. Twenty percent felt the same way about the risks of regular use of cannabis.

For the first time in the history of the survey, those viewing the risks of regular use of cannabis as minimal at worst outnumbered those who felt that the risks of weekly consumption of alcohol to the point of intoxication were low.

According to the survey, 29 percent of people would be ready to lift criminal sanctions against the use of all drugs. This was nine percentage points higher than in 2018. Fifty three percent of the population opposed punishment for cannabis use.

“Opinions on the illegality of drug use are clearly in a flux. This corresponds to the increasingly common view also in international debate, that responses to use should primarily come from the social and health care sector”, said Research Professor of THL Pekka Hakkarainen.

In the survey, 24 percent felt that cannabis should be legally available for any purpose, while 56 percent supported making cannabis available only for medical purposes. In 2018 the corresponding numbers were 18 and 54 percent.

Safe spaces for drug consumption, an issue which has been a focus of much public debate, were seen as acceptable, either completely, or partially, by 65 percent. In 2018 the figure was 50 percent.

The results on drug use and attitudes toward drugs among Finns are based on the THL Drug Survey which has been repeated as a mail-in questionnaire at intervals of about four years since 1992.

A total of 3,857 people aged from 15 to 69 responded to the survey questionnaire.