News » More Teens Have Smoked Marijuana Than Cigarettes In The Last Month

December 14, 2010 by justin

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In a recent study conducted by the National Institutes of Health, 21.4 percent of twelfth graders used marijuana in the past 30 days, while only 19.2 percent smoked cigarettes. This continues a trend of increased marijuana use by the 8th, 10th, and 12th graders included in the Monitoring the Future report.

These numbers are still significantly lower than their peak in the 1970′s, when 37 percent of students had tried marijuana, but does reverse the trend from 2002 – 2007 when use repeatedly dropped. Gil Kerlikowske, director of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy or “drug czar”, placed blame on the medical marijuana movement. “Mixed messages about drug legalization, particularly marijuana, may be to blame,” he said. In a television interview with Gwen Ifil, he defended the claim by saying that “smoked marijuana is not medicine.”

The study also showed that cigarette use has remained steady, binge drinking has declined, but the use of ecstasy has increased.

[source PBS]

Tags: alcohol, cigarette, drug use, ecstacy, Gil Kerlikowske, marijuana, National Institute of Health, pot, teen