FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
March 26, 2012
Contact: Tony Duong, Deputy Director
Asian American Recovery Services, Inc.
(415) 243.4888
New Data on Drug Use Among Asian Americans Living in the San Francisco Bay Area
Asian American Recovery Services, Inc. (AARS) Deputy Director Tony Duong announced today
findings of a recently published peer reviewed article citing differences in drug use patterns among Chinese, Filipino and Vietnamese men who live along the San Francisco Bay Area’s Peninsula.
Daniel Toleran, the lead author, and colleagues found Filipinos reported higher use rates for alcohol, cigarettes, marijuana and crack cocaine in the last 30 days compared to their Chinese and Vietnamese counterparts. The data findings also show Filipino and Vietnamese men who have sex with men (MSM) reported alcohol use to be significantly greater than their Chinese counterpart. Additionally, other tobacco use, believed by the authors to be the use of blunts or marijuana mixed with tobacco was found among study participants who had criminal justice system involvement. Moreover, age group analyses indicated study participants ages 18-25 years used alcohol at a higher rate than other older adults in the study. The article was published in the Journal of Substance Abuse and Ethnicity in their Spring edition released on March 22, 2012.
Jeff Mori, AARS, Inc. Executive Director stated, “study findings confirm the importance of collecting and reporting information by ethnic groups rather than referring to everyone as Asians.” Mr. Toleran, the Project’s Director suggested, if data is collapsed into a general Asian or Asian and Pacific Islander group category, as is often the case in many studies, the unique behaviors of the individual groups are lost.
The study was funded by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration’s Center for Substance Abuse Prevention as part of its Strategic Prevention Framework initiative. Study participants took part in a 5-week intervention study to mitigate substance abuse, Hepatitis C and HIV among high-risk adults in San Francisco, San Mateo and Santa Clara Counties of California.
