The Australian Institute of Health and Welfare’s (AIHW) annual national drug survey has been released with a state-by-state snapshot. Interestingly, 55% West Australians supported pill testing at designated sites and 44% supported supervised drug consumption facilities.
Nationally, fewer people are smoking (down to 11% in 2019 from 12.2% in 2016). However, this trend was bucked in WA with a slight increase in the number of daily smokers (11.9% from 11.5%). Fewer people in their 20s and 30s are smoking. Those who are smoking are generally smoking less and more are rolling their own. Habitual e-cigarette use is up from 31% in 2016 to 39% in 2019. In WA, 12.2% of vapers were smokers (from 6.6% to 12.2%), In WA, 73% of people have consumed alcohol in the past 12 months and there were slight declines in the proportions of people drinking daily and weekly between 2016 and 2019. There was 17.2% who drank at a lifetime risk level and 26% with single-occasion risk – both down from 2007 levels but similar to 2016.
As for other drug use in WA, ecstasy and amphetamine use was slightly less (2.1% from 2.7% for amphetamine) and cocaine use is up from 1.6% to 2.4%.
The survey in this infograph shows some interesting insight into medicinal cannabis use. In WA, illicit cannabis use has slightly declined from 11.6% to 11.2%.