Overseas influence blamed for rise in marijuana abuse among young Chinese
- Prosecutors in Nanjing say it has become ‘a serious problem’ – especially for those who have studied abroad
- It comes after national body reports a 25 per cent rise in abuse of the drug in 2018 from a year earlier
Marijuana abuse has become “a serious problem” for young people in China, especially those who have studied overseas, according to prosecutors in the east of the country.
The drug’s use was more common in certain Western nations than in China, and with the growing number of Chinese going abroad, the risk of exposure had increased, the Nanjing People’s Procuratorate said in a statement last week.
“Young people studying abroad are more vulnerable to Western subcultures,” it said.
The prosecutors in Nanjing, Jiangsu province said they had handled 10 drug smuggling cases since 2017, seven of them involving marijuana, without giving earlier figures.
In one case, three young men were caught buying marijuana from a university student in the city who had smuggled in the drug and confectionery containing cannabis via international mail. The student, surnamed Song, was arrested after anti-narcotics officers detected marijuana in a parcel at customs in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province in September 2017.
According to the prosecutors, the three men had started smoking marijuana when they were studying overseas and continued the habit when they went back to China in 2016. The men received a total of nearly 9kg of marijuana in 18 purchases from overseas dealers over a period of 18 months. Song was sentenced to 39 months in jail for drug trafficking, while the three buyers were convicted on drug use charges. One was jailed for three years but the penalty for the other two men was unclear.