An annual survey found that 14 percent of high school students in the past month took marijuana through vaping.
The percentage of high school senior classes who said they had consumed marijuana with a vaporizer at least once in the past 30 days nearly doubled between 2018 and 2019, according to new data from the Monitoring the Future study.
The increase, from 7,5 percent to 14 percent, was the second-largest jump in drug use ever found in the annual survey, which asked high school students in the United States about their drug use and opinions for the past 45 year. (The first biggest jump was that of teenagers vaping last year)
"We're seeing a pretty remarkable increase in the use of vaporization products to take marijuana," said Jack Stein, chief of staff of the National Institute on Drug Abuse, which funds the survey in the United States.
Vaporizing nicotine also remains popular with teens: 25 percent of high school students said they had vaporized nicotine in the past 30 days, and 11,7 percent said they vaporized nicotine every day. About 8 percent of them said in the survey this year that they vape because they are "addicted" to it, compared to just 3,6 percent in 2018.
Before the problems with vapen in the United States started
Those increases are especially important to researchers studying the potential health risks of vaping. First, there was the peak of it terrifying lung injuries associated with vaping illegal THC-containing products in the summer and fall in the United States.
Then, a recent study of more than 30.000 people found that people who use e-cigarettes are at an increased risk of developing respiratory disease after just three years of using the products. The risk of illness is still lower with vaping than with traditional cigarettes. However, only a small percentage of teens smoke traditional cigarettes and smoking rates continue to drop - so when teens pick up vaping they often add damage that wasn't there before.
It's important to note that the Monitoring the Future survey data is collected between February and June each year, so teens were asked about their drug use before reports of vaping injuries and deaths began circulating in America.
"I suppose we will see an increase in perceived risk [from vaping] next year," said Richard Miech, co-investigator of the Monitoring the Future study and professor at the University of Michigan. Usually, among teens, when the perceived risk of a substance goes up, its use goes down. "We'll see if we see a reduction in vaping along with that next year," he says.
Increase in “normal” use of marijuana
The survey also found that daily marijuana use increased from 2018 to 2019 for high school students. That probably has to do with the increase in vaping, Miech says. “It makes sense, especially for use in schools. If you can vape it, you can just have the weed in your pocket. The obstacles that prevent some teens from always using marijuana in school are being overcome, and the technology allows kids to use it more than they otherwise would, ”he says. Just under 5 percent said they use marijuana on a daily basis, compared to 3,4 percent in 2018, and 3 percent say they specifically vape marijuana on a daily basis.
Overall, marijuana use has remained fairly stable in recent years, although both daily use and vaping of marijuana have increased. That could be due to one of two scenarios, Miech says: it could be that instead of smoking marijuana, people are using the marijuana through vaping in their teens. Or, he says, it could be that the teens who smoke marijuana are also vaping it. “As daily use is increasing, it may be more consistent with the second. They don't just replace vaping with smoking, ”he says.
Surprisingly, there has been little change in marijuana use in recent years, Miech says, as the data from Monitoring the Future show that teenagers have found marijuana less and less risky over time. But that has not led to an increase in use. That pattern may be related to the combination of two factors: the use of cigarettes among teenagers has fallen sharply in recent years, and the fact that children who have never smoked cigarettes are much less likely to use marijuana, Miech says.
“More and more of these children have never smoked a cigarette, which is growing significantly,” he says. “Had it not been for that decline, marijuana use would probably be at the highest level we've ever seen. But because smoking has declined, marijuana use has declined. ”
However, those patterns can change when kids vaping nicotine start vaping marijuana - similar to the way kids who smoke cigarettes are more likely to start smoking weed. “I think it is too soon to tell. Vaping has not been around for very long. But it's starting to look like it, 'says Miech.
Other use of resources among teenagers
The Monitoring the Future study also found that teen use of other drugs, such as prescription opioids and alcohol, is still declining.
Oxycontin and Vicodin abuse among high schools is at its lowest level since 2002, the survey indicated. “In general, the numbers have never actually been super high. But they are declining, which is important, ”says Stein. Adderall use also continues to decline in these high school students, although more lower middle grades in high schools report using Adderall - 2,5 percent said they used it in 2019, compared to 1,3 percent in 2014.
Alcohol consumption has also declined over the past five years, with only 52,1 percent of senior high school graders reporting alcohol in 2019 compared to about 60 percent in 2014. Also, only 14,4 percent of high school seniors said in the 2019 survey that they drink heavily: five or more drinks in a row. That's a five percentage point drop from 2014, when 19,4 percent of older high school students said they did.
“It's a consistent trend. Alcohol is really the most commonly used substance, ”says Stein. "It's hard to say the reason, but we really hope that the very aggressive prevention efforts now start to help."
Sources including NYTimes (EN), TheVerge (EN)
