Prevalence and risk factors of psychoactive substance abuse among students in Ethiopia: A systematic review and meta-analysis

Background: Substance uses were seen in 18-25 years old age groups who are more than 40% world population, from which Africa was the region with the highest proportion accounting 60% in 2016. This review aimed to assess the burden of substance abuse among students in Ethiopia. Methods: A comprehensive search was conducted in PubMed/Medline; Science direct and African Online Journal without language and date restriction. The Heterogeneity among the included studies was checked with forest plot, chi(2) test, I-2 test, and the p-values. All cross-sectional studies reporting rate of prevalence of psychoactive substance among students were included and the rest were excluded. Result: A total of 545 articles were identified from different databases and 42 articles were selected for evaluation. Twenty-nine Articles with 22, 012 participants were included. The overall prevalence of psychoactive substance abuse was 32.28% (95% confidence interval (CI): 26.74 to 37.82). Conclusion: The review revealed that one-third of the high school and higher education students used different psychoactive substances in Ethiopia. Registration: This Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis was registered in Prospero international prospective register of systemic reviews (CRD42020146656) on April 28/2020.