The curse of drugs has reached Irish children. Drug dealing is taking place in some of Dublin’s primary schools, a study has revealed.
Blanchardstown Local Drugs & Alcohol Task Force (BLDATF), a community group which has been monitoring drug trends in the D15 postal district since 2014, said that 2023 was the first year drug dealing in local primary schools had been reported.
At the beginning of last year, the Citizens’ Assembly on Drug Use called for the wholesale liberalisation of laws on the possession of dangerous drugs, including cocaine, cannabis, heroin, and opioids.
The task force said that drug dealing was reported in “a number” of local primary schools, but declined to reveal exactly how many “to uphold confidentiality”.
These schools, it observed, were based in a mixture of affluent and socio-economically deprived areas, “indicating that drug dealing is a community wide issue that crosses all socio-economic boundaries”.
It continued: “The profile of primary school-based drug users includes males and females aged from 11 years, with cannabis herb, cannabis oil and nitrous oxide being used during school.”
In 2023, according to BLDATF, drug dealing took place in all eleven mainstream local secondary schools and drug use among pupils is increasing.
BLDAFT also noted that “the normalisation of drug use has featured prominently” since monitoring began. It added: “The common perception was that alcohol and drugs were widely used, risk free and socially acceptable.”