Many teenagers who occasionally smoke cannabis don’t think that they are putting themselves at risk of developing issues of addiction or health problems as they grow older.

However Paul Dillon, author of “Teenagers, Alcohol and Drugs” and Generation Next speaker, has commented that “… experimenting with cannabis puts you at risk of coming into contact with a range of other drugs… There is also the possibility that after breaking one taboo – smoking an illegal drug like cannabis – it is much easier to break another.”

More information about the effects of smoking cannabis can be found at the National Cannabis Prevention and Information Centre website.

A new Australian study “Outcomes of occasional cannabis use in adolescence: 10-year follow-up study” carried out in Victoria confirms that even occasional cannabis use can lead to the use of hard drugs and excessive drink in their 20’s and beyond. The study and its findings were recently published in the British Journal of Psychiatry.

The Study:
Assessed almost 2,000 teenagers at the age of 13-14 years old
Assessed again four times during their teenage years, and
Assessed again twice in their early 20s.

The Results:
34% of the students reported using cannabis in their teens.
64% of these users said they used cannabis occasionally and the rest used it weekly
60% said they were still using cannabis by the time they reached early adulthood
77% of these users said they used cannabis occasionally, and
23% used cannabis weekly.

The Findings:

  • Teenagers who occassionally used cannabis were at higher risk of illegal drug use, and alcohol and tobacco dependence when they reached early adulthood, and
  • Occasional teenage cannabis users were less likely to have gained post-school qualifications by the age of 24 years.

Lead researcher Professor Louisa Degenhardt, of the National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre  (NDARC) at the University of New South Wales, said: “… even those students who only used cannabis occasionally in their teenage years faced a higher risk of drug problems in adulthood too.”

“It seems clear that in countries such as Australia, where cannabis use is the norm among young people, even infrequent cannabis use is related to later levels of drug use of all kinds. Whether this is due to learning processes, the influence of social networks or other factors, it is still the case that early onset occasional cannabis use is a marker for later drug use and drug problems.”

Writer Helen Splarn. Editor Dr Ramesh Manocha.

Source: National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre