School children in Bermuda are far less likely to use alcohol or cigarettes than United States and Canadian students, a recent study has found.

And while in the US one in every five eighth grader regularly smokes cigarettes, in Bermuda that figure is slashed by half -- with less than one in every ten students in that age group regularly getting a nicotine fix.

But the latest results from the National Drug Commission's 1997 School Survey also found that Bermuda's youths were just as prone to dabbling with marijuana as overseas students.

And for youths in all three countries, alcohol was easily the drug of choice -- mirroring the same pattern in the adult population.

Canadian school children were the worst offenders with 63.4 percent of 15 to 17 year-olds admitting they had indulged in the month before the study.

Far fewer Bermudian students in the same age bracket were "current users'' of alcohol with just 38.4 percent ticking the yes box.

`Good news' in NDC survey Both public and private schools participated in the study -- the most comprehensive ever conducted for the Island -- in which 3,434 students aged between 11 and 17 at thirteen schools filled out questionnaires.

For students aged 15 to 17 far more of Canada's than Bermuda's school children said they drank alcohol and smoked tobacco cigarettes.

Roughly ten percent more Canadian students smoked cigarettes than in Bermuda, where just under 17 percent of youths aged between 15 and 17 did.

For both Canada and Bermuda, one student in every four had used marijuana in the 30 days before filling out the questionnaire.

While almost 19 percent of Bermudian tenth graders smoke cigarettes, the figure is far less than in the US where almost 30 percent are in the early stages of addiction.

But for the same age group, Bermuda's marijuana users outnumber those in the US by a slim margin, with 20.6 percent of students here indicating they were current users while just 20.5 percent did so in the States.

NDC chief executive officer Derrick Binns said the results were encouraging.

"It is good news for Bermuda that our students' rates of use of the legal substances alcohol and tobacco are lower than those of our neighbours,'' he said.

"These results can further serve to motivate our prevention agencies to continue their efforts to encourage students to stop using, or to choose not to start using, alcohol and other drugs.'' SURVEY SUR