Drug addiction in Hong Kong elite schools: how anxiety led pair to cannabis, coke, Xanax and rehab as teens
- Both students were taking ketamine at 13 and had drug rehabilitation when they were still teenagers
- Both say too little help is available for young people with drug problems, and a children’s support group says schools should make more time for drug education
Mehek Gidwani was 12 years old when she began inhaling an over-the-counter pain relief spray for three-minute highs; by the time she was 13 she had been to her first nightclub and taken ketamine. Ernest Chang began taking ketamine when he was 13 and was addicted to cocaine by the time he was 19.
Although they did not know each other at the time, they had a couple more things in common – they both began experiencing anxiety in their early teens and used the drugs to help deal with that; and both went to prestigious international schools in Hong Kong.
Anxiety, stress and depression are increasingly recognised as risk factors for substance abuse among young people. After a consultation that lasted less than an hour, Chang’s family doctor prescribed him Xanax to cope with his anxiety. He was 14.
“I was doing a lot of Xanax and drinking at school. I’d pour white wine or vodka into a water bottle and drink it in class,” says Chang, who went to the German Swiss International School.
Chang grew up in Florida and came to Hong Kong with his family aged 12. He says his father wasn’t really involved in his parenting and although he spoke to his mother, she did not understand what he was going through.
“They were busy people. My mother was in denial of something – perhaps that I was gay or that I had a mental health issue,” says Chang, who was diagnosed as bipolar at 14.