Teens Continue To Vape While Shunning Illegal Drugs And Alcohol

Teenaged visitors smoking electronic cigarettes at the 2017 Vapexpo Spb exhibition of the vape industry at Lenexpo

The annual survey conducted by the National Institute on Drug Abuse has found a sharp increase in the number of teenagers who use e-cigarettes. The Monitoring the Future survey found that 37 percent of high school seniors admitted to vaping, a nine percent increase from 2017. 21 percent said they had vaped in the past 30 days, which is ten percent higher than it was last year. 

The increased use of vape pens is not limited to ones that contain nicotine. 13.1 percent of teens said that they vaped marijuana, up from 9.5 percent last year. 

“The most surprising news to me was how frequently teenagers are vaping,” Dr. Wilson Compton, Deputy Director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse, told NBC News. “Right now over one-third of high school seniors report using a vaping product.”

There were some positive trends in the survey, which found that a fewer number of adolescents were abusing opioids and alcohol. Only 17.5 percent of high school seniors said that they had been drunk the past month, and under 14 percent admitted to binge-drinking, which is defined as having at least five drinks in one sitting.

When it comes to abusing illegal drugs, the survey found that the use of drugs like cocaine, ecstasy, and LSD to be at historic lows. Even opioid use is down from previous years, something that is encouraging to officials who are trying to combat the opioid epidemic that is sweeping the nation.

The survey found that the rate of marijuana use appears mostly unchanged, despite multiple states legalizing the drug for both medicinal and recreational use. 

Dr. Nora Volkow, Director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse, said on Fox News, "What is it that we're doing right with teenagers that we're not doing with adults? We know drug taking among adolescents is a very social behavior. Now that kids use more and more social media and have less time in face-to-face encounters, the question is do they have less of an opportunity to be in an environment where they are exposed to drugs?"

Photo: Getty Images


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