Smoking tobacco, use of marijuana and other psychoactive substances by students of Silesian universities.

Introduction: These days, it is observed worldwide that the number of smokers drops, however, use of e-cigarettes and other psychoactive substances becomes more popular. This survey was conducted in the years 2019 to 2020 using a group of 193 people, 124 females and 69 males, at two Silesian universities.

Aim: The purpose of this survey was to estimate patterns concerning use of tobacco and psychoactive substances by students. The survey was conducted by a survey including 27 questions.

Results: Most of the surveyed persons (78%) were non-smokers. Among active smokers, 30% of them started smoking at the age of 12 to 15, 45% of them at 16 to 18, and 77% smoked first before 18th birthday. Among smoking subjects, 90% smokes up to 5 cigarettes a day. Most subjects replied that "curiosity" was a cause to start smoking. Students often declared so-called "occasional smoking". Smoking in public bothered most (67%) subjects. Half of subjects declared that they never smoked marijuana. Mostly, students smoking tobacco decided to use marijuana as well. About 6% of subjects used other drugs, aside from marijuana. 3% of subjects tried amphetamine, LSD or ecstasy at least once in life.

Coclusions: Tobacco smoking frequency in students of Silesian universities was 22%, that is a level similar to other regions of Poland. Due to variation on the market of psychoactive substances, particularly among young people, continuous surveillance is recommended.