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January 12, 2025We heard some encouraging news in 2024 about the decline in overdose deaths, the decline in teen vaping, the efforts to reduce the stigma associated with mental health illnesses and addiction and alcoholism, and about the drug companies being called to answer for flooding our country with deadly pain pills. This week's article is about the decline in teen drinking and smoking and marijuana usage. According to the results from a large annual national survey, teen drug use hasn’t rebounded from its drop during the early years of the COVID-19 pandemic. The federally funded Monitoring the Future survey has been operating since 1975. This year’s findings are based on responses from about 24,000 students in grades 8, 10 and 12 in schools across the country. About two-thirds of 12th graders this year said they hadn’t used alcohol, marijuana, cigarettes or e-cigarettes in the previous 30 days. That’s the largest proportion abstaining since the annual survey started measuring abstinence in 2017. Among 10th graders, 80% said they hadn’t used any of those substances recently, another record. Among 8th graders, 90% didn’t use any of them, the same as was reported in the previous survey. The only significant increase occurred in nicotine pouches like Zyn. About 6% of 12th graders saying they’d used them in the previous year, up from about 3% in 2023. The University of Michigan’s Richard Miech, who leads the survey, said: “It’s hard to know if we’re seeing the start of something, or not.” Let's hope and pray that we'll hear more good news in 2025. Here's the link: Most US teens are abstaining from drinking, smoking and marijuana, survey says | AP News