Except for the ganja, drug use in kids has been dropping across the board and this includes cigarettes and alcohol. (Science Daily: Teen use of any illicit drug other than marijuana at new low, same true for alcohol)
The Rockhouse purpose isn't to seek out 'feel good' stories for Christmas but there's nothing in this one to give you a reason to feel bad and that feels just fine.
Overall, the proportion of secondary school students in the country who used any illicit drug in the prior year fell significantly between 2015 and 2016. The decline in narcotic drugs is of particular importance, the researchers say. This year's improvements were particularly concentrated among 8th- and 10th-graders.
Considerably fewer teens reported using any illicit drug other than marijuana in the prior 12 months -- 5 percent, 10 percent and 14 percent in grades 8, 10 and 12, respectively -- than at any time since 1991. These rates reflect a decline of about one percentage point in each grade in 2016, but a much larger decline over the longer term.
"That suggests that physicians and dentists may want to consider reducing the number of doses they routinely prescribe when giving these drugs to their patients, and in particular to teenagers," Johnston said.
The Rockhouse purpose isn't to seek out 'feel good' stories for Christmas but there's nothing in this one to give you a reason to feel bad and that feels just fine.
Overall, the proportion of secondary school students in the country who used any illicit drug in the prior year fell significantly between 2015 and 2016. The decline in narcotic drugs is of particular importance, the researchers say. This year's improvements were particularly concentrated among 8th- and 10th-graders.
Considerably fewer teens reported using any illicit drug other than marijuana in the prior 12 months -- 5 percent, 10 percent and 14 percent in grades 8, 10 and 12, respectively -- than at any time since 1991. These rates reflect a decline of about one percentage point in each grade in 2016, but a much larger decline over the longer term.
- Science Daily
That news works just fine for Christmas and this isn't opinion but rather the University of Michigan's study.
Let's confirm this is not a short-term flash in the pan:
In fact, the overall percentage of teens using any of the illicit drugs other than marijuana has been in a gradual, long-term decline since the last half of the 1990s, when their peak rates reached 13 percent, 18 percent and 21 percent, respectively.
- Science Daily
Reductions in drug use included alcohol and nicotine from cigarettes:
The use of alcohol by adolescents is even more prevalent than the use of marijuana, but it, too, is trending downward in 2016, continuing a longer-term decline. For all three grades, both annual and monthly prevalence of alcohol use are at historic lows over the life of the study. Both measures continued to decline in all three grades in 2016.
Declines in cigarette smoking and certain other forms of tobacco use also occurred among teens in 2016, continuing an important and now long-term trend in the use of cigarettes.
- Science Daily
Here's part of a solution:
Users of narcotic drugs without medical supervision were asked where they get the drugs they use. About four in every 10 of the past-year users indicated that they got them "from a prescription I had."
"That suggests that physicians and dentists may want to consider reducing the number of doses they routinely prescribe when giving these drugs to their patients, and in particular to teenagers," Johnston said.
- Science Daily
The above segments are only excerpts and the article has fuller information. Overall, the news on drugs is much better than it is bad although the latter is a horror with regard to opiates. (Ithaka: Shocking Increase in Opiate Addiction in Rural Infants)
One of the most mystifying aspects of current drug use is seeing kids who still smoke cigarettes. Some had seen my brokedown self as a first-hand case study and yet still smoked so that echoes with why, why, why?
Note: just to be sure, that one is rhetorical. The why is not so important in this context since the purpose in presenting the article is to show the news is not really true unless we have the whole perspective and it's much better overall than it seems on TV.
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