Dec 16, 2014
By: Dr. Nora Volkow, Director, National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA)
At the end of a year that has seen further tragic deaths from addiction and new designer drugs that put young people at risk, today’s results from the 2014 Monitoring the Future (MTF) survey of drug use among adolescents provide a dose of welcome optimism. No major drug use indicators increased significantly between last year and this year; use of alcohol, cigarettes, and illicit and prescription drugs either held at the same level or, in many cases, declined among American teens.
Particularly heartening was the fact that students’ marijuana use has not increased in the past two years: This year, 21.2 percent of seniors, 16.6 percent of 10th graders, and 6.5 percent of 8thgraders used marijuana in the past month—high percentages, but not significantly different from 2013. Cigarette and alcohol use (including binge drinking) continued their steady downward trend that we’ve seen for several years now. Abuse of prescription opioids also declined since 2013 and is down by a third to a half over the last 5 years (depending on the opioid and the grade).
We have also seen diminished abuse of inhalants by the youngest teens, who historically are most likely to abuse these readily available substances, as well as diminished abuse of over-the-counter drugs like cough syrups. And although synthetic cannabinoids like “K2” and “Spice” (also known as “synthetic marijuana”) have only been tracked in the survey for the past two years for all three grades, use of these very dangerous and unpredictable drugs is also down from last year.
Although there are no doubt many possible contributing factors to these trends, I like to think that prevention messages are making an impact. Teens are getting the message from various sources that drugs are not good for their developing brains, and there are much better, healthier, and more enjoyable ways to spend their time.
Read More: Good News from Monitoring the Future 2014Particularly heartening was the fact that students’ marijuana use has not increased in the past two years: This year, 21.2 percent of seniors, 16.6 percent of 10th graders, and 6.5 percent of 8thgraders used marijuana in the past month—high percentages, but not significantly different from 2013. Cigarette and alcohol use (including binge drinking) continued their steady downward trend that we’ve seen for several years now. Abuse of prescription opioids also declined since 2013 and is down by a third to a half over the last 5 years (depending on the opioid and the grade).
We have also seen diminished abuse of inhalants by the youngest teens, who historically are most likely to abuse these readily available substances, as well as diminished abuse of over-the-counter drugs like cough syrups. And although synthetic cannabinoids like “K2” and “Spice” (also known as “synthetic marijuana”) have only been tracked in the survey for the past two years for all three grades, use of these very dangerous and unpredictable drugs is also down from last year.
Although there are no doubt many possible contributing factors to these trends, I like to think that prevention messages are making an impact. Teens are getting the message from various sources that drugs are not good for their developing brains, and there are much better, healthier, and more enjoyable ways to spend their time.
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