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February 07, 2019NATIONAL CANNABIS SURVEY, 4TH QUARTER 2018 To monitor cannabis consumption before and after the legislative change, Statistics Canada is conducting the National Cannabis Survey (NCS) every three months (quarterly) throughout 2018. Findings from the fourth quarter of the National Cannabis Survey (NCS), which was collected from mid-November to mid-December 2018 and was designed to monitor cannabis consumption and related behaviours before and immediately after legalization of cannabis, are now available and include results for every province.
The latest release covers topics such as rates of consumption by men versus by women, rates of medical versus non-medical use of cannabis, frequency of use by medical and non-medical users, legal access of cannabis, amount spent on cannabis, methods of consumption, and where users buy cannabis. Some highlights follow.
CANNABIS USE
The 2018 fourth quarter National Cannabis Survey showed that about 4.6 million people nationally, or 15.4 per cent of Canadians aged 15 years or older, reported using cannabis in the previous three month period, similar to results from 2018 third quarter. All Atlantic provinces showed higher consumption rates than the national average, and across the country, only Quebec, Manitoba, and BC showed lower prevalence of cannabis use this quarter, relative to the national average.
A lower proportion (11.3 per cent) of the female population aged 15 and over reported use, compared to 19.4 per cent of males. The younger cohort, aged 15-24, reported 27.4 per cent of population having used cannabis in that period. The survey showed that prevalence of cannabis use declined steadily with age. Note: Because the target population for the survey is non-institutionalized persons 15 years of age or older, living in Canada's ten provinces, there is no information on the extent of cannabis use by those over the legal age in their province of residence.
MEDICAL AND NONMEDICAL USE OF CANNABIS
Nationally, for the fourth quarter 2018, nearly 50 per cent of users reported cannabis use for non-medical reasons. About 24 per cent used cannabis for medical reasons, either with or without a medical document, and about 28 per cent used cannabis for both medical and non-medical reasons.
EXPENDITURES
Nationally, 27.6 per cent of cannabis users reported spending nothing on cannabis consumed during the fourth quarter, while another 33.2 per cent spent between $1 and $100. Twenty three percent of users spent between $101 and $250, and sixteen per cent spent more than $250.
Those cannabis users who were non medical users were more likely to spend nothing, or less than $100 on cannabis, while those who used cannabis with a medical document were most evenly distributed in terms of amount spend on cannabis (about 25 per cent in each expenditure category).
FACTORS CONSIDERED WHEN DECIDING TO PURCHASE CANNABIS
Among all factors considered when deciding to purchase cannabis, the most prevalent was quality and safety of product, followed by lowest price. More than a quarter stated that location (such as proximity to home) or the availability of their preferred strain as deciding factors.
These data are available from the Statistics Canada "National Cannabis Survey, fourth quarter 2018" publication. Other data are available on the StatsCannabis site.
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