American Academy of Pediatrics
Despite concerns that legalizing marijuana use for adults would
make it easier for adolescents to get ahold of it, a new study in Washington
State shows that teens find it no easier now than before the law was passed in
2012.
An
abstract of the study, "Adolescents' Ease of Access to Marijuana Before
and After Legalization of Marijuana in Washington State," was presented at the Pediatric Academic Societies 2016 Meeting in Baltimore on
Sunday, May 1.
Researchers compared 2010 and 2014 data from the Washington
State Healthy Youth Survey. Each year's survey included questions about ease of
access to marijuana, alcohol, cigarettes and other illicit drugs.
There
was virtually no change in the proportion of teens who reported it was
"easy" to access marijuana in 2010 (55 percent), compared to 2014 (54
percent) after the new law was enacted, according to the study.
This seemingly good news was tempered by additional findings suggesting that current public health efforts around drug abuse prevention may be less effective for marijuana than for other substances teens now perceive as more difficult to obtain.
Significantly more adolescents said it was "hard" to access alcohol
in 2014 (47 percent, compared with 43 percent in 2010), cigarettes (53 percent
in 2014; 42 percent in 2010), and other illegal drugs such as cocaine, LSD, and
amphetamines (82 percent in 2014; 75 percent in 2010).
"It
is both surprising and reassuring that teens didn't perceive that marijuana was
easier to access after it was legalized for recreational use by adults,"
said senior investigator Andrew Adesman, MD, FAAP, chief of developmental and
behavioral pediatrics at the Cohen Children's Medical Center of New York.
"It was interesting and somewhat concerning, though, that while teens
responded that it was harder to access cigarettes, alcohol, and psychoactive
drugs abuse in 2014 compared to 4 years earlier, they didn't report increased
difficulty in obtaining marijuana during that same time period," he said.
Principal
investigator Natalie Colaneri said she hopes the findings will prompt increased
efforts to reduce teens' access to marijuana in Washington and other states now
considering the legalization of adult recreational marijuana use.
"Given
the detrimental health effects associated with adolescent marijuana use, it is
important that states that choose to legalize marijuana take steps to minimize
use by teens. States should specifically implement measures that make it more
difficult for teens to access marijuana in the first place," she said.