The Secretary of State for Health, Javier Padilla, has denied that the Government is considering opening the door to the legalization of recreational cannabis consumption in Spain and has insisted that the Executive's measures in this area are exclusively limited to its use for therapeutic purposes.
"It is not, by any means, in the plans. It would not even be a competence of this Ministry. The competence of this Ministry is limited to use for exclusively medicinal purposes," Padilla indicated in response to the PP senator Antonia López, who had asked him about a supposed regulation of cannabis for recreational use.
In the Mixed Commission for the Study of Addiction Problems, held this Tuesday in the Senate, Padilla emphasized that the eventual recreational legalization of cannabis "has never been a debate" within the current coalition government and that regulatory action has focused solely on Royal Decree 903/2025, which regulates the medicinal use of cannabis in Spain and was approved last October.
In this context, the Secretary of State has highlighted that, according to the latest ESTUDES survey, the prevalence of cannabis consumption among adolescents aged 14 to 18 in Spain is at its lowest level since 1994.
"This directly clashes with the narratives that some sectors and ideological positions try to convey, which suggest that young people are living in a kind of daily cannabis nirvana. We have the lowest figure for cannabis consumption in the last 365 days and also in the last 30 days," Padilla defended.
Faced with the accusations of the PP senator Antonia López, who reproached the Government for trivializing cannabis consumption, Padilla urged her to point out any message from the Ministry of Health that goes in that direction.
"A trivializing message would be, for example, talking about the cultural essence of having a few beers every day, trivializing the most frequently consumed drug in our country and the one that causes the highest number of deaths and hospitalizations per year," Padilla stated, alluding to statements by the president of the Community of Madrid, Isabel Díaz Ayuso.
The new National Strategy on Addictions will arrive this year
In another order of things, the Secretary of State has announced in his appearance that the next National Strategy on Addictions will be released during this year, replacing the previous roadmap, which remains in effect although it was designed for the period 2017-2024.
Asked about the situation of fentanyl consumption in Spain, Padilla has specified that, with the available information, it cannot be said to be a problem of great magnitude linked to this substance in the country. He has pointed out that, according to the 2024 EDADES survey, only 0.3 percent of the population has used fentanyl without a prescription on occasion, and that 148 people were admitted to Spain for dependence on this opioid, out of a total of 49,000 admissions for addictions.
"I believe that one of the fundamental elements is linked to the existence of a sufficiently guaranteed healthcare system to ensure the population that there is control over the prescription and dispensing of opioid medications, and specifically, fentanyl, but also because there are sufficiently solvent drug and addiction control policies for this not to happen," he explained.
"ESTUDES is a benchmark in Europe"
During the debate, the PP senator questioned some of the results disseminated by the ESTUDES survey. "In 2024, the Government of Navarra requested the ESTUDES data corresponding to its autonomous community to prepare a specific report on behavioral addictions. With this data, it was concluded that 16 percent of Navarrese minors played in physical casinos. However, Navarra has not had any physical casinos for years," explained the 'popular' senator.
In response to these criticisms, Padilla has replied that the word "casino" does not appear in ESTUDES and has defended the quality of the study. "It seems like a rather strange hill to die on. To denigrate the ESTUDES study, which, in fact, originates from the People's Party Government, when you were in government in the Delegation of the National Plan on Drugs, and whose indicators are constructed jointly with the autonomous communities," he maintained.
Immediately after, the Secretary of State has emphasized that the results of ESTUDES are "totally consistent" with those obtained in the regional surveys. "Evidently, we are going to continue working with a methodology that works, that is validated, that is a reference at the European level and that, at the level of all the autonomous communities, regardless of political affiliation, they embrace for its usefulness and its solvency," he concluded.