Annual NIDA Survey Shows Declines in Teen Drug Use

The kids are all right.

Every year, the National Institute of Drug Abuse (NIDA), under the auspices of the National Institutes of Health, conducts its Monitoring the Future survey of drug use among American young people in the 8th, 10th, and 12th grades.

This year, students got very good marks. “We are heartened to see that most illicit drug use is not increasing, non-medical use of prescription opioids is decreasing, and there is improvement in alcohol and cigarette use rates,” said Dr. Nora Volkow, Director of NIDA.

Here are some highlights from this year’s study:

— Despite nationwide concerns over prescription opioid and heroin abuse, heroin use among students has hit historic lows, while “narcotics other than heroin” continue to decline as well. Only 4.4% of high school seniors reported Vicodin use in the past year, compared to more than 10% in 2003.

—The downward trend in teen cigarette smoking continues, and is presently at the lowest rate in the study’s history. 5.5% of high school seniors had smoked, compared to 10.7% in 2010. The highest rate of smoking recorded among seniors was 25% in 1997. Among 10th graders, daily smoking has been cut in half in the past five years, down to 3%.

—For the first time since the annual study began, marijuana use exceeds cigarette use among 12th graders. 35% of high school seniors reported past-year cannabis use, and 6% reported daily use. (Daily use of cigarettes was 5.5%). Disapproval rates concerning regular smoking have continued to rise, even as the disapproval rates concerning marijuana risk continue to fall among teens.

—Alcohol use continues its slow but steady downward trend among teens, “with significant reductions seen in the past five years in nearly all measures.” However, it remains the most commonly used drug, 58% of seniors having used it in the past year.

—Synthetic marijuana, the class of Spice/K2/herbal incense drugs, continues to decline in popularity, presumably due to fears about adverse side effects.

—16% of 12th graders reported using e-cigarettes in the past month, although only one out of five student users said they were vaping nicotine. 13% of 8th graders said they had no idea what was in the e-cigarette device they were using. Other answers ranged from flavorings to marijuana.

Marijuana Use Up, Up, Up

NIDA releases annual survey of teen drug use.

Research compiled from an annual survey of 8th, 10th and 12th graders by the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) shows that “marijuana use increased among eighth-graders, and daily marijuana use increased significantly among all three grades. The 2010 use rates were 6.1 percent of high school seniors, 3.3 percent of 10th -graders, and 1.2 percent of eighth-graders compared to 2009 rates of 5.2 percent, 2.8 percent, and 1.0 percent, respectively.”

At a news conference held to announce the results of the study, NIDA director Dr. Nora Volkow said that “high rates of marijuana use during the teen and pre-teen years, when the brain continues to develop, place our young people at particular risk. Not only does marijuana affect learning, judgment, and motor skills, but research tells us that about 1 in 6 people who start using it as adolescents become addicted.”

The annual report, called “Monitoring the Future,” takes the temperature of current teen drug use through interviews with more than 50,000 students across the country. The research is conducted at the Survey Research Center in the Institute for Social Research at the University of Michigan.

The survey showed that teen use of Ecstasy is on the increase as well. According to NIDA, “The MTF survey also showed a significant increase in the reported use of MDMA, or Ecstasy, with 2.4 percent of eighth-graders citing past-year use, compared to 1.3 percent in 2009. Similarly, past-year MDMA use among 10th-graders increased from 3.7 percent to 4.7 percent in 2010.”

As for cigarettes, the recent downward trend has “stalled” after several years of steady improvement, said NIDA. “Greater marketing of other forms of tobacco prompted the 2010 survey to add measures for 12th-graders’ use of small cigars (23.1 percent) and of tobacco with a smoking pipe known as a hookah (17.1 percent).”

For the first time, according to the survey, “declines in cigarette use accompanied by recent increases in marijuana use have put marijuana ahead of cigarette smoking by some measures. In 2010, 21.4 percent of high school seniors used marijuana in the past 30 days, while 19.2 percent smoked cigarettes.”

The survey detected a downward trend in binge drinking across the board. Prescription drug abuse remained fairly steady.

The survey also tracks students’ perception of drugs and their risks, and the degree to which drug are viewed as harmful. The report concludes: “Related to its increased use, the perception that regular marijuana smoking is harmful decreased for 10th- graders (down from 59.5 percent in 2009 to 57.2 percent in 2010) and 12th-graders (from 52.4 percent in 2009 to 46.8 percent in 2010). Moreover, disapproval of smoking marijuana decreased significantly among eighth-graders.”

The survey at the University of Michigan is led by Dr. Lloyd Johnston, operating under a NIDA grant. Additional information on the MTF Survey, as well as comments from Dr. Volkow can be found at http://www.drugabuse.gov/drugpages/MTF.html.