Source: National School Surveys As seen in figure 8, males are more inclined to use marijuana than their female counterparts, with the past month use prevalence outpacing those of the females in every other country among those selected. Dominica recorded the highest male prevalence of 17.89% while Haiti registered the lowest (0.66%). The highest prevalence among females was found in St. Lucia (7.24%) and the lowest in Haiti (0.60%)
Overall Prevalence The prevalence of persons who currently smoke marijuana in Guyana and Jamaica in 2016 was 4.6% and 28%, respectively. In Barbados, that figure was between 6.2-8.8% (2006-2007) and in The Bahamas, the figure was 3% in 2017, with an average of 7.9 years since the respondents started using marijuana. Lifetime prevalence in Barbados rose from 13.5% in 2014 to 16% in 2016. Data showed a one-point increase between research years, 2006 and 2007. In 2006 the number of persons who use marijuana daily was 32.1%, whilst the weekly and monthly usage were 29.2% and 13.4%, respectively. Also, in 2006 18.2% of Barbadians admitted to using marijuana within the last 12 months and 5.3% used marijuana at least once for the year. In 2017, 17% of persons in The Bahamas said they used marijuana monthly, with 6.6% admitting having used in the last 12 months and 3% within the year of survey. In 2016, Guyana had a daily, weekly and monthly use prevalence of 1.9%, 0.8%, and 3.3%, respectively, while the percentage of persons who used marijuana within the past year was 9.8%.
8. Data Analysis and Results Data were collected from various ministries and agencies, from four selected Caribbean countries, namely Grenada, Barbados, the Bahamas, and Guyana. The list of agencies includes the police service, the prison service, hospitals and other agencies that treat marijuana-related disorders, among others. The data collected were not common for each country, therefore the analyses vary across countries, both in terms of approach and output. This, therefore, limits the degree of comparability of the results among the countries. In fact, comparison of the result among the countries will likely lead to misleading conclusions and should be avoided. Furthermore, whereas costs and benefits are presented, it must not be assumed that these are the complete list of costs and benefits, rather the list of costs and benefits were heavily influenced by the availability of data in each of the countries. The 97