Drink and drugs used as sex aids

Young adults are drinking and taking drugs to get better sex, it has been found.

People between the ages of 16-35 use alcohol and drugs as part of deliberate sexual strategies, according to findings published in BioMed Central's journal, BMC Public Health.

A third of 16 to 25-year-old men and a quarter of women surveyed said they drink to increase their chances of sex, while cocaine, ecstasy and cannabis are used to enhance sexual arousal or prolong sex.

Most of the respondents said they had their first drink when 14 or 15; three quarters had tried cannabis, and around 30% had tried ecstasy or cocaine.

The research also found that participants who had been drunk in the past four weeks were more likely to have had five or more partners, have sex without a condom and to have regretted sex after drink or drugs in the past year. Cannabis, cocaine or ecstasy use was linked to similar consequences.

Furthermore, women were up to four times more likely to have had sex before the age of 16 if they drank or used cannabis.

Lead author and director of LJMU's Centre for Public Health, Professor Mark Bellis commented:

"Trends in recent decades have resulted in recreational drug use and binge drinking becoming routine features of European nightlife.

"Millions of young Europeans now take drugs and drink in ways which alter their sexual decisions and increase their chances of unsafe sex or sex that is later regretted. Yet despite the negative consequences, we found many are deliberately taking these substances to achieve quite specific sexual effects."