US
Marijuana is increasingly the first “gateway” substance for adolescents, according to new research.
According to Katherine M. Keyes, a professor of epidemiology at Columbia University and co-author of the new study, published in the journal Drug and Alcohol Dependence, This trend is not because teens are smoking cannabis more than ever. Rather, the change is because teens are smoking cigarettes and drinking less while the numbers for marijuana have held steady.
“As we’ve seen the dramatic declines in alcohol and tobacco, we haven’t seen dramatic declines in marijuana, so now every year it’s more and more likely that kids are starting their drug-use careers with marijuana,” said Keyes. She also said that rates of teen drinking and smoking started to fall, long before the recent wave of pro-marijuana lobbying.
The authors of the study analyzed 40 years of surveys from American high school seniors. In 1995, three-fourths of seniors who used both marijuana and cigarettes had tried cigarettes first. In 2016, only 40% had tried cigarettes first. Today, less than half of teens try alcohol and cigarettes before trying cannabis.
The authors believe that this trend will most likely continue as marijuana becomes less stigmatized and more and more states vote to legalize the drug. Though teens are not supposed to smoke marijuana even in the states that have fully legalized it, “it’s not going out on a huge limb to suggest that marijuana is going to be more available at a lower cost to adolescents,” says Keyes.