By Join Together Staff | May 17, 2012 | Leave a comment | Filed in Legislation, Prevention, Tobacco, Young Adults & Youth

Fewer teenagers and young adults in the United States are smoking, a new government report finds. The drop can be attributed to several causes, including an increase in cigarette taxes, Bloomberg reports.

Daily smoking among teens and young adults fell to 15.8 percent in 2010, down from 20.4 percent in 2004, according to the report, which is based on data from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration’s (SAMHSA) National Survey on Drug Use and Health. Among teens ages 12 to 17, daily smoking dropped from 3.3 percent to 2 percent.

Higher cigarette taxes, school health education programs that target cigarette use, antismoking campaigns, and increased enforcement of laws prohibiting the sale of tobacco products to minors, all have contributed to the decrease, the report notes.

READ MORE via Fewer Teens and Young Adults Smoking | The Partnership.

“I think of something that’s happened to me … a lot of times, and I’m really sick of it,” one boy said when handed the microphone.

For that reason, Maza and Cabanas brought their presentation, called “Crossing the Line,” to the middle school Friday morning, first as an assembly for seventh-graders, and then for eighth-graders.

Students from the middle school’s drama club and student council worked with the high-schoolers to create a series of skits, songs, dances, videos and slide shows to teach their peers about bullying and its consequences.

In one clip from “Phineas and Ferb” on the Disney Channel, former heavyweight boxing champion Evander Holyfield trains the cartoon character Phineas to fight the class bully. Students were asked to identify the bully, the victim, bystanders and the victim’s ally.

In another video, middle-schoolers held up cards with harmful stereotypes scrawled across them: Stuck-up, Jock, Loser, Idiot, Loner.

“A number of students from your middle school felt that this was a problem,” Maza told the crowd.

Some re-enactments focused on teen suicide as a result of bullying. In one, a girl almost slits her wrists as a former friend, posing as her crush, insults her on Facebook. In another, two teenage girls kill themselves after they are teased for being lesbians.

The eighth-graders were asked to raise their hands if they had seen bullying in specific locations around the school. Almost everyone raised their hands to report they had seen bullying in the halls and on school buses.

Naugatuck High School junior Mason Cabanas, 17, holds a microphone so City Hill Middle School student can talk during the ‘Crossing the Line’ anti-bullying program Friday at City Hill. –LUKE MARSHALL

Cabanas, 17, and Maza, 16, said they hoped the assembly would be as successful as it was at the high school, where it gained fame after it was presented in January to sophomores. Students were invited to tell stories of being bullied, moving each other to tears, and their antagonists apologized, the teens said. Everyone present fingerprinted a pledge to be an ally for victims.

Since then, the climate at the high school has noticeably changed, Cabanas said.

“Teachers have come up to us and said, ‘Thank you for doing this,’” Cabanas said.

Maza and Cabanas created the program as a project for DECA, the school’s marketing club, after watching a student be verbally attacked in the hallway last November.

“Mason and I thought it was ridiculous how many students were walking by as if it was a normal thing,” Maza said.

They presented their efforts in DECA’s national competition last month in Salt Lake City; they have yet to hear whether they won anything.

Eighth-graders Madison Jensen and Theresa Montoni helped host Friday’s assembly, which did not include story sharing or the thumbprint pledge.

Those will be saved for two years, when the students might see the assembly again, Cabanas said.

“We felt that if we did it now, they wouldn’t feel so much as sophomores,” Cabanas said.

via Students spread anti-bullying message | Citizen’s News.

Join Together

A new government study finds 22 percent of white women have smoked cigarettes during their pregnancy, ABC News reports. In contrast, 14 percent of black women, and 6.5 percent of Hispanic women, have done so. The study was conducted by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA).

“When pregnant women use alcohol, tobacco, or illicit substances they are risking health problems for themselves and poor birth outcomes for their babies,” SAMHSA Administrator Pamela S. Hyde said in a statement. “Pregnant women of different races and ethnicities may have diverse patterns of substance abuse. It is essential that we use the findings from this report to develop better ways of getting this key message out to every segment of our community so that no woman or child is endangered by substance use and abuse.”

READ MORE via 22 Percent of White Women Have Smoked Cigarettes During Pregnancy | The Partnership.

Marijuana use among teens rose in 2011 for the fourth straight year—a sharp contrast to the considerable decline that had occurred in the preceding decade. Daily marijuana use is now at a 30-year peak level among high school seniors.

“Synthetic marijuana,” which until earlier this year was legally sold and goes by such names as “K2″ and “spice,” was added to the study’s coverage in 2011; one in every nine high school seniors (11.4%) reported using that drug in the prior 12 months.

Alcohol use—and, importantly, occasions of heavy drinking—continued a long-term gradual decline among teens, reaching historically low levels in 2011.

Energy drinks are being consumed by about one third of teens, with use highest among younger teens.

READ MORE via University of Michigan News Service | Marijuana use continues to rise among U.S. teens, while alcohol use hits historic lows.

“Our concerns are grounded in science,” the attorneys general wrote in their letter. They note that the U.S. Surgeon General, in a report issued in March, found there is a “causal relationship between depictions of smoking in the movies and the institution of smoking among young people.” The report found that while images of smoking in movies had decreased over the past decade, in 2010, almost one-third of the top-grossing movies with ratings of G, PG or PG-13 had images of smoking, NBC Connecticut reports.

The attorneys general are asking film companies to include anti-tobacco spots on DVDs and Blu-ray videos of movies that show smoking. They want the companies to certify in the closing credits in future movies with images of smoking that no payoffs were made in connection with any depictions of tobacco use. They also are asking that future movies do not show displays of tobacco brands.

via Attorneys General Ask Movie Studios to Cut Smoking Scenes in Films Aimed At Youth | The Partnership.

A new study finds parents greatly underestimate their children’s exposure to secondhand smoke. While 13 percent of parents said their children were exposed to cigarette smoke, blood tests showed the rate was 55 percent.

In children, secondhand smoke can cause ear infections, more frequent and severe asthma attacks, respiratory symptoms and infections, and a greater risk of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The researchers at the University of California, San Francisco, tested 496 blood samples from young children. The study tested blood levels of cotinine, a chemical produced by the body after it is exposed to nicotine, Reuters reports.

In the Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine, the researchers noted children do not necessarily need to be around someone who is smoking in order to be exposed to secondhand smoke. They can be exposed if they spend time in a room where someone has recently been smoking.

Cotinine testing is not readily available to the general public, according to study co-author Dr. Neal Benowitz.

via Parents Greatly Underestimate Children’s Secondhand Smoke Exposure | The Partnership.

The New York Times reports the committee wants to ensure that doctors and patients are receiving accurate information about the risks and benefits of painkillers, without regard to the financial interests of drug manufacturers.

The committee is also seeking information from several academic experts about their links to drug makers.

Companies involved in the inquiry are Purdue Pharma, which makes OxyContin, Endo Pharmaceuticals, which makes Percocet, and Johnson & Johnson, maker of Duragesic. The American Pain Foundation, a patient advocacy group, and the Pain and Policy Studies Group at the University of Wisconsin, also received letters from the committee.

via Senate Opens Investigation into Financial Ties Related to Prescription Painkillers | The Partnership.

The Partnership Attitude Tracking Study found past-year use of marijuana rose from 31 percent in 2008, to 39 percent (six million teens) in 2011. The survey found lifetime use increased from 39 percent in 2008, to 47 percent (eight million teens) in 2011. The last time marijuana use was this widespread among teens was in 1998, when past month use of marijuana was at 27 percent.

“Parents are talking about cocaine and heroin, things that scare them,” Steve Pasierb, President and CEO of The Partnership at Drugfree.org, told the AP. “Parents are not talking about prescription drugs and marijuana. They can’t wink and nod. They need to be stressing the message that this behavior is unhealthy.”

The survey suggests an association between teens who smoke marijuana more regularly and the use of other drugs. Adolescents who smoked 20 times or more a month were almost twice as likely, as those who smoked marijuana less often, to use Ecstasy, cocaine or crack.

The survey suggests teen marijuana use has become a normalized behavior. Only 26 percent agree with the statement, “In my school, most teens don’t smoke marijuana,” down from 37 percent in 2008. Also, 71 percent of teens say they have friends who use marijuana regularly, up from 64 percent in 2008.

According to the survey, 10 percent of teens said they used prescription pain medication in the past year, down from a peak of 15 percent in 2009, and 14 percent in 2010.

via Survey Finds Marijuana Use on the Rise Among Teens | The Partnership at Drugfree.org.