Epidemiology of Substance Abuse among the Youths in Makueni County, Kenya

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Date
2025-02
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Kenyatta University
Abstract
Majority of youths all over the world ignorantly rely on one or more types of drugs for their everyday activities, including Mandrax, Cocaine, Tobacco, Heroine, Khat, Morphine, Alcohol, Amphetamines, Ephedrine, and Glue among others. This study’s purpose was to evaluate the epidemiology of substance abuse among the youths in Makueni County, Kenya. The broad objectives that guided the study were; to determine the epidemiology of substance abuse among the youths in Makueni County, Kenya. A Cross-sectional mixed method design study was undertaken, with the target population consisting of all youths from Makueni County's eight main marketplaces. To get 384 participants for the research, purposive sampling was employed to obtain the 8 Major urban centres while simple random selection approach was employed to obtain respondents in each market. Qualitative data was collected using 8 key informants to supplement the quantitative data collected from the youths. To obtain primary data, a self-administered questionnaire was employed. Quantitative data was analysed using Descriptive as well as inferential statistics while qualitative narrative data was grouped into themes and was presented inform of texts with verbatim quotes used to amplify the voice of the informants. Majority of research participants were male 64% with age ranging from 18-21yrs (35%). Majority of participants had primary education 38.6% with the lowest 12.6% having University education. Prevalence of Drug/Substance abuse stood at 62.3 % with alcohol (58.3%) being the most commonly abused drug/Substance. Hard Drugs e.g cocaine and heroin was the least abused with 96.9% reporting they had never abused. Pearson correlation between gender, age and education level on prevalence of drug abuse in Makueni showed a weak positive relationship(r=0.032), weak negative relationship(r=-0.064) and a significant negative relationship(r=-0.212) respectively. The study also established that high unemployment rates 62.3%, easy availability of drugs 34.3%, Peer pressure 72.3%, cheap cost of drugs 28.3% and poverty level 15.1% are main contributory factors to drug abuse. A chi square run on the factors contributing to drug abuse also indicated a significant relationship between the factors and prevalence of drug abuse in Makueni County (X2,(1 N=350)= .73 p>.05). The study concludes that there is high prevalence of Drug/Substance abuse among the youths in Makueni County and both the County Government, national Government and the community in general must put stringent measures to curb the easy availability, sale and buying of abusive Drugs and other substances in the county.
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A Thesis Submitted in Partial Fulfilment of the Requirements for the Award of the Degree of Master of Science in Nursing (Mental Health & Psychiatry) in the School of Health Sciences of Kenyatta University February 2025 1. Priscilla Kabue 2. Jacob Masika
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