Today@Dal

From Wednesday's Chronicle Herald:

One in four Nova Scotia high school students have consumed a mix of alcohol and energy drinks, one of the highest rates in the country, a new national study shows.

The study published Jan. 16 in CMAJ Open, an online journal of the Canadian Medical Association, found that on average one in five Canadian high school students reported having consumed a mix of the two.

“The prevalence of use was highest among Aboriginal (33.8 per cent) and black (25 per cent) students, and among those residing in British Columbia (25.8 per cent) and Nova Scotia (25.6 per cent),” says the study, carried out by researchers at Dalhousie University’s faculty of medicine.

The study used a nationally representative sample of more than 36,000 grades 7 to 12 students who participated in the 2010-2011 Youth Smoking Survey.

Those surveyed were asked whether they had consumed mixed or premixed alcohol with an energy drink during the past 12 months.

“Use of alcohol mixed with energy drinks was higher among those in higher grades and among those who were older,” says the study, authored by researchers Sunday Azagba, Don Langille, and Mark Asbridge of Dalhousie medical school’s community health and epidemiology department.

Read the rest of this story at the Chronicle Herald's website.