Teen marijuana use down despite greater availability

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2015-09/jhub-tmu091515.php

Public Release: 15-Sep-2015
Teen marijuana use down despite greater availability
Concerns abound over whether laws legalizing pot for medical, recreational use will get drug into hands of more young people
Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health

Marijuana use among American high school students is significantly lower today than it was 15 years ago, despite the legalization in many states of marijuana for medical purposes, a move toward decriminalization of the drug and the approval of its recreational use in a handful of places, new research suggests.

The Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health researchers say, however, that marijuana use is significantly greater than the use of other illegal drugs, with 40 percent of teens in 2013 saying they had ever smoked marijuana. That number was down from 47 percent in 1999 but up from 37 percent in 2009. By contrast, just three percent had ever tried methamphetamines in 2013 as compared to nine percent in 1999.

The findings, published online this month in the journal Drug and Alcohol Dependence, also suggest that a gender gap in marijuana use -- where boys outnumbered girls as users of the drug -- is shrinking, with males and females now using marijuana at similar rates. And while white and black teens once used marijuana at similar rates, now blacks report using the drug more often.

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