There’s a current news release from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) on the subject of youth and drug abuse. It is more than a little dismaying.
The report gives the numbers of young people who are abusing different types of drugs. The report only includes people aged 18 to 25, the ages of heaviest drug abuse, generally speaking. Here’s what an analysis of drug use statistics showed about the drug use of our young adults on any average day:
- 3.2 million of them used marijuana
- 57,304 used heroin
- 51,319 used cocaine
- 46,179 used hallucinogens
- 17,868 used inhalants.
Remember, these numbers are for each and every day!
Also, on that average day, there were thousands of people using drugs for the first time:
- 2,470 initiated marijuana use
- 1,754 misused a prescription drug
- 1,200 used cocaine
- 850 used stimulants
- 566 used an inhalant
- 258 used heroin
- and 174 tried methamphetamine.
Its Not Too Late to Talk to Your Kids
If you’re a parent, I hope this convinces you that you should do an extremely thorough job of educating your children on the harm that can come from using these substances. None of them are harmless and all of them can land people in the emergency room when things go wrong. Some of them are so strong that one use can kill them, like inhalants and of course, some prescription drugs and heroin.
Other drugs are so addictive that some people have said that as of their first use of that drug, they were addicted. I’ve heard people talk about prescription opiates, heroin, methamphetamine or crack cocaine this way. For many people, addiction is slower than this but you don’t know ahead of time which it is going to be.
SAMHSA also notes how many people from this age group were admitted to drug rehabs over the course over the past year: 403,756.
The purpose of Narconon is to eliminate drug abuse and addiction from our world. We would like to help you keep your family and your community safe from drugs. There are plenty of materials in our Parent Center that can help you protect your children from harm, no matter what age they are. You can find the Parent Center here: http://www.narconon.org/drug-abuse/parent-center.html.
If we can provide any other help, please call us at 1-800-775-8750.
