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420: Pot smokers have begun jonesing at a younger age in part because weed is easier to obtain than tobacco. Junior's High Times Why more kids smoke marijuana than cigarettes By Steve Fox THE BIENNIAL YOUTH Youth Risk Behavior Survey, released May 21 by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, contained a bombshell: More U.S. teens are now smoking marijuana than smoke cigarettes. That's right. Among high school students, current use—defined as use within the last 30 days—is now higher for marijuana than for cigarettes. According to the CDC, 21.9 percent of teens reported smoking cigarettes within the last month, while 22.4 percent smoked marijuana. There is a lesson here, but one that policy makers won't want to hear: If the idea is to stop teen drug use, the approach we've used with tobacco is better than the approach taken with marijuana. That means regulation of adult use, rather than prohibition. That may seem hard to believe, but the long-term trends are telling. In the decade from 1993 to 2003, the percentage of teens reporting current cigarette use dropped by nearly one-third, from 30.5 percent to 21.9 percent. Other smoking indicators dropped dramatically, too. For example, the proportion that had smoked a full cigarette by age 13 fell from 26.9 percent to 18.3 percent. For marijuana, despite a marginal, statistically insignificant decrease last year, the long-term trend has been heading in the opposite direction. Past-month marijuana use has risen nearly 5 percentage points since 1993, when it was just 17.7 percent. Even more alarming, the number of kids smoking marijuana before age 13 went up from 6.9 percent in 1993 to 9.9 percent last year. Though the exact numbers vary, other youth surveys document the same trend. The latest federally funded Monitoring the Future survey, for example, found current marijuana use higher than cigarette use among 10th graders but still a bit lower among eighth and 12th graders—again with marijuana use well up from a decade ago and tobacco use down. Why is teen cigarette smoking dropping so impressively, while marijuana use remains essentially stuck at high levels? Two words: "We Card." If you've been in just about any store that sells cigarettes in the last few years, you've seen the signs: "Under 18, No Tobacco. We Card." The bright red and yellow placards are impossible to miss. The effort, begun in 1995, has become almost ubiquitous. While the We Card campaign is a voluntary effort, it was the result of public and legal pressure. Americans made it clear we don't like kids buying cigarettes, and legislators in many states responded with tough laws. Merchants who sell cigarettes to youths under 18 can face stiff fines and, in many jurisdictions, can lose their tobacco license. It has worked—not perfectly, but to a substantial degree—as witnessed by a new question the CDC added to its survey in 2001: Do you usually get your cigarettes by buying them in a store or gas station? For kids under 18, this figure dropped sharply, from 8.6 percent in 2001 to 6.2 percent in 2003. That's more success than can be attributed to the White House's anti-drug television campaign, which has been carpet-bombing with nearly two dozen commercials over the nation's airwaves to the tune of $150 million taxpayer dollars per year. The 30-second spots present some quasi-realistic scenarios, ranging from teenage pregnancy to an accidental shooting, insinuating that the underlying cause was marijuana ingestion. Amazingly, Congress keeps funding this boondoggle even though the official, government-funded evaluation (conducted by the University of Pennsylvania's Annenberg School for Communication) found "little evidence" of any positive effects. "The trend data in marijuana use is not favorable," the researchers wrote, "and for the primary target audience, 14- to 16-year-olds, past-year use increased from 2000 through 2003." Under a policy of regulation, society has control over tobacco retailers. We can fine them, suspend their business licenses or put them out of business if they don't follow the rules. So when America became serious about curbing tobacco sales to minors, retailers got the message. We have no such control of unlicensed, unregulated marijuana dealers. Efforts to eliminate them haven't even put a minor crimp in marijuana's availability: For 2 1/2 decades running, more than 80 percent of teens have told the Monitoring the Future survey that marijuana is "easy to get." Today, precisely zero marijuana sellers have "We Card" signs by the cash register. That probably won't change any time soon. And children will continue to smoke pot as easily as they drink soda pop. Steve Fox, a father of two, is director of government relations for the Marijuana Policy Project in Washington, D.C. Send a letter to the editor about this story to letters@metronews.com. [ Silicon Valley | Metroactive Home | Archives ]