Most US teens are abstaining from drinking, smoking and marijuana, survey says

By Mike Stobbe | The Associated PressNEW YORK (AP) — Teen drug use hasn’t rebounded from its drop during the early years of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to the results from a large annual national survey released Tuesday.About two-thirds of 12th graders this year said they hadn’t used alcohol, marijuana, cigarettes or e-cigarettes in the previous 30 days. That’s the largest proportion abstaining since the annual survey started measuring abstinence in 2017.Among 10th graders, 80% said they hadn’t used any of those substances recently, another record. Among 8th graders, 90% didn’t use any of them, the same as was reported in the previous survey.The only significant increase occurred in nicotine pouches. About 6% of 12th graders saying they’d used them in the previous year, up from about 3% in 2023.Whether that has the makings of a new public health problem is unclear. The University of Michigan’s Richard Miech, who leads the survey, said: “It’s hard to know if we’re seeing the start of something, or not.”It’s hard to know if we’re seeing the start of something, or not. -Richard MiechThe federally funded Monitoring the Future survey has been operating since 1975. This year’s findings are based on responses from about...