Teen rates of marijuana use are going down in Colorado, according to the state department of public health and environment’s biannual healthy kids Colorado survey.
The survey, conducted in 2023, is now available and found, “12.8% of high school students in Colorado reported using cannabis in the past 30 days, down from 13.3% in 2021. This also represents a nearly 42% decrease since 2011, the year prior to the legalization of cannabis for adults 21 and older in Colorado.”
The timing is what makes these numbers significant. Many experts expected rates of adolescent marijuana use to increase when COVID restrictions were lifted and kids rejoined their peers. Turns out that didn’t happen and Colorado’s data are in step with a CDC report showing nationally fewer teens are trying marijuana compared to a decade ago (when recreational cannabis wasn’t legal in any U.S. states).
Additionally, this teen drop in weed use comes as, for the first time, a new report in the peer-reviewed journal Addiction shows more adults are using cannabis than alcohol. The report pulled data from 40 years of National Survey on Drug Use and Health reports and found around 17.7 million people reported daily or near-daily marijuana use in 2022 while only 14.7 million people said that drank that often.
The Cannabis Report – June 20th, 2024
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Teen Cannabis Use In Colorado Is Dropping As National Adult Use Surpasses Alcohol Consumption Hannah Leigh
