Drug and Alcohol Abuse

	In 2000, the Monitoring the Future (MTF) survey found the illicit drug use remains widespread among American young people. The survey also found that marijuana continues to be the most widely used drug.
	The use of several drugs by juveniles have gone down since their peaks in the 1990s, including inhalants, LSD, crystal methamphetamine, and rohypnol.
	12^th graders have been showing the least amount of decline of overall drug use. However they have showed significant declines in their use of crack cocaine and powder cocaine during 2000.
	In 2000 the largest increase observed was from MDMA (“ecstasy”). The amount of use increased in grades 10, 11, and 12.
	In 1999 the MTF showed increases of ecstasy in the Northeast, then in 2000 the use of ecstasy increased in the other three regions, suggesting a diffusion of the drug from the Northeast. Ecstasy is now more prevalent among American teens than cocaine.
	According to a Corporation Drug Policy Research Center study:

1. About one out of every six high school seniors averaged at least one alcoholic drink every other day.

2. More than a quarter of all teenagers experience a drinking-related problem (such as missing school) on at least three occasions in any given year, or a more serious problem (such as a fight) at least once.

3. About 25% of teenagers engage in two or more high-risk drinking activities (combining alcohol with other drugs, driving wile drinking, and so on) at least once per year.

Drug related arrests of juveniles have nearly doubled between 1970 and 2000.

Violence

	Juveniles commit about 800 homicides annually. Violence committed both by and against children has become a serious national problem.
	Of the 1,300 juvenile murder victims in 2000, an average of three per day (20%) were under age five.
	Sixty-two percent of all juvenile murder victims and 57% of murdered youth who were 13 or older were killed with a firearm.
	Forty percent were killed by family members, 45% by acquaintances, and only 15% by strangers.

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