PRESS RELEASE ISSUED BY THE STATE UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK

AT ALBANY

EMBARGOED FOR RELEASE AT 6:00A.M. EST, FEBRUARY 20, 2001.

NOTE TO EDITORS
These results will be presented today (Tuesday, February 20, 2001) at a meeting of the World Health
Organization (WHO) in Stockholm, and are now being simultaneously released in the 30 participating
European countries and in the United States.

Headline
A multi-national study of tobacco, alcohol and marijuana use released today finds important differences
between high school students in 30 European countries and in the United States. The findings suggest that
cigarette smoking and alcohol use is less prevalent among 10th grade students in the United States than in
almost all European countries. The lifetime use of marijuana and other illicit drugs in the United States is
higher than in any European country.

The study
The European School Survey Project on Alcohol and Drugs (ESPAD) is a coordinated set of school
surveys, coordinated by sociologist Bjorn Hibell at the Swedish Council for Information on Alcohol and
other Drugs. This second ESPAD study was conducted in 1999 among approximately 95,000 students in
10th grade in the 30 participating countries. The survey in each country is representative of the national 10th
grade student population, with the exception of the survey in Russia being representative of the capital of
Moscow. The 1999 ESPAD report is available upon request (362 pages).

Comparison with the United States

The Monitoring the Future (MTF) study has been conducted at the University of Michigan for the past 26
years under the sponsorship of the National Institute of Drug Abuse. In 1999, this nationally representative
study elicited information on tobacco, alcohol and illicit drug use among 14,000 10th grade students in the
United States. The European ESPAD study was specifically developed to be comparable to the MTF study
in the United States. The principal investigator of the American study, social psychologist Lloyd Johnston,
states, “ Having survey data which can be meaningfully compared across countries is very rare in the
substance abuse field. ESPAD is by far the largest such undertaking to date, and I believe it will prove very
valuable both to policy makers and scientists in a great many countries.”

Key findings
• Cigarette smoking in past 30 days. The MTF study finds that 26% of 10th grade students in the
United States had smoked at least one cigarette in the past 30 days. The ESPAD survey finds that an
average of 37% of 10th grade students in the 30 participating European countries had smoked a
cigarette in the past 30 days (39% in Northern Europe, 33% in Southern Europe and 38% in Eastern
Europe) This proportion varies among European countries from 16% in Cyprus to 67% in the
Greenland. Cyprus and Romania were the only European countries that had a lower 30-day rate of
cigarette smoking than did the United States. (See Figure 1 and Figure 2 for details).
• Alcohol use in past 30 days. The MTF study finds that 40% of 10th grade students in the United
States had consumed alcohol in the past 30 days. The ESPAD survey finds that an average of 61% of
10th grade students in the 30 participating European countries had consumed alcohol in the past 30
days (62% in Northern Europe, 63% in Southern Europe and 58% in Eastern Europe). This proportion
varies among European countries from 36% in the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM)
to 85% in Denmark. FYROM was the only European country that had a lower rate than the United
States. (See Figure 3 and Figure 4 for details).
• Lifetime use of marijuana/cannabis. The MTF study finds that in 1999 41% of 10th grade students in
the United States had used marijuana or cannabis in their lifetimes. The ESPAD survey finds that an
average of 17% of 10th grade students in the 30 participating European countries had ever used
marijuana or cannabis (19% in Northern Europe, 14% in Southern Europe and 16% in Eastern Europe)
This proportion varies among European countries from 1% in Romania to 35% in the Czech Republic,
France and the United Kingdom. All the participating European countries had a lower rate of lifetime
cannabis use than did the United States. (See Figure 5 and Figure 6 for details).
• Use of any illicit drug other than marijuana. The MTF study finds that 23% of 10th grade students
in the United States had some illicit drug other than marijuana in their lifetimes. The ESPAD survey
finds that an average of 6% of 10th grade students in the 30 participating European countries had used
some illicit drug other than marijuana in their lifetimes (6% in Northern Europe, 5% in Southern
Europe, and 7% in Eastern Europe). This proportion varies among European countries from 2% in
Cyprus and Finland to 12% in the United Kingdom. All the participating European countries had a
lower rate of lifetime use of illicit drugs other than marijuana than did the United States. (See Figure 7
and Figure 8 for details).
• Lifetime use of specific illicit drugs other than marijuana. The MTF study finds that 16%
of 10th grade students in the United States have used amphetamines, 10% have used LSD or other
hallucinogens, 8% have used cocaine, 6% have used ecstasy, and 4% have used crack. The ESPAD
survey finds the corresponding average figures for 10th grade students in the participating countries to
be 2% for amphetamines, 2% for LSD and other hallucinogens, 1% for cocaine, 1% for ecstasy and 1%
for crack. The highest European rates of amphetamine use were found to be 8% in the United
Kingdom and 7% in both Estonia and Poland. The highest European rates of hallucinogen use were
found to be 5% in the United Kingdom, Ireland and the Czech Republic, and 4% in Moscow. The
highest European rates of cocaine use were found to be 3% in the United Kingdom and the
Netherlands. The highest European rates of ecstasy use were found to be 6% in Latvia and 5% in
Ireland. The rate of crack use was found to be 2% or less in all the European countries. The
proportion of students reporting having ever injected any drug was quite low in all countries. The only
countries with a rate of drug injection over 1% were Russia (2%) and the United States (3%).

Further information
Further information on the European School Survey Project on Alcohol and Drugs will be provided by
Thor Bjarnason. Thor Bjarnason is Assistant Professor of Sociology at SUNY-Albany and Research
Fellow at the Icelandic Center for Social Research and Analysis in Reykjavik, Iceland. He is the principal
investigator of the Icelandic ESPAD survey, member of the steering board of the ESPAD project from
1993, and co-author of the 1999 ESPAD report.

Thor Bjarnason, PhD,

Department of Sociology,
University at Albany,
State University of New York,
Albany, NY 12222.
Tel.: (518) 442 4672
Fax: (518) 442 4936
E-mail: [email protected]

Questions regarding the Monitoring the Future study in the United States should be directed to
Lloyd Johnston, PhD, Institute for Social Research, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor MI 48106.
Tel. (734) 763-5043. Fax (734) 936-0043. E-mail: [email protected].
European Survey Project on Alcohol and Drugs (ESPAD)

45
Percentage

39
40 37 38

35 33

30
26
25

20

15

10

0
UNITED STATES EUROPE Northern Europe Southern Europe Eastern Europe

Figure 1
Proportion of 10th grade students
who report smoking cigarettes in the past 30 days
by region
European Survey Project on Alcohol and Drugs (ESPAD)

Cyprus 16
Romania 24
United States 26
Iceland 28
Slovenia 29
Sweden 30
Portugal 31
Malta 32
Estonia 32
Poland 33
United Kingdom 34
Greece 35
The Netherlands 36
Hungary 36
Slovak Republic 37
Ireland 37
F.Y.R.O.M. 37
Denmark 38
Croatia 38
Ukraine 40
Norway 40
Lithuania 40
Latvia 40
Italy 40
Faroe Islands 41
Finland 43
France 44
Czech Republic 44
Russia (Moscow) 45
Bulgaria 50
Greenland 67

0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
Percentage
Figure 2
Proportion of 10th grade students
who report smoking cigarettes in past 30 days
by country
European Survey Project on Alcohol and Drugs (ESPAD)

70
Percentage

62 63
61
60 58

50

40
40

30

20

10

0
UNITED STATES EUROPE Northern Europe Southern Europe Eastern Europe

Figure 3
Proportion of 10th grade students
who report any alcohol consumption in the past 30 days
by region
European Survey Project on Alcohol and Drugs (ESPAD)

F.Y.R.O.M. 36
United States 40
Iceland 43
Croatia 46
Faroe Islands 48
Portugal 49
Hungary 51
Italy 54
Romania 55
Norway 55
Ukraine 56
Sweden 56
Bulgaria 57
Latvia 58
Greenland 59
Slovak Republic 60
France 60
Poland 61
Finland 61
Cyprus 61
Slovenia 62
Estonia 62
Russia (Moscow) 63
The Netherlands 66
Lithuania 73
Ireland 74
Malta 75
United Kingdom 76
Greece 77
Czech Republic 77
Denmark 85

0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90
Percent

Figure 4
Proportion of 10th grade students
who report any alcohol consumption in past 30 days
by country
European Survey Project on Alcohol and Drugs (ESPAD)

45
Percentage

41
40

35

30

25
19
20
17 16
14
15

10

0
UNITED STATES EUROPE Northern Europe Southern Europe Eastern Europe

Figure 5
Proportion of 10th grade students
who report ever having used marijuana/cannabis
by region
European Survey Project on Alcohol and Drugs (ESPAD)

Romania 1
Cyprus 2
Malta 7
Faroe Islands 7
Sweden 8
Portugal 8
F.Y.R.O.M. 8
Greece 9
Finland 10
Hungary 11
Norway 12
Lithuania 12
Bulgaria 12
Estonia 13
Poland 14
Iceland 15
Croatia 16
Latvia 17
Slovak Republic 19
Ukraine 20
Russia (Moscow) 22
Greenland 23
Denmark 24
Slovenia 25
Italy 25
The Netherlands 28
Ireland 32
United Kingdom 35
France 35
Czech Republic 35
United States 41

0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45
Percent
Figure 6
Proportion of 10th grade students
who report ever having used marijuana/cannabis
by country
European Survey Project on Alcohol and Drugs (ESPAD)

Percentage 25
23

20

15

10
7
6
6
5
5

0
UNITED STATES EUROPE Northern Europe Southern Europe Eastern Europe

Figure 7
Proportion of 10th grade students who have used
any illicit drug other than marijuana/cannabis in their lifetime
by region
European Survey Project on Alcohol and Drugs (ESPAD)

Finland 2
Cyprus 2
Sweden 3
Malta 3
Faroe Islands 3
F.Y.R.O.M. 3
Ukraine 4
Greenland 4
Greece 4
Slovak Republic 5
Iceland 5
Hungary 5
France 5
Bulgaria 5
Portugal 6
Norway 6
Croatia 6
Slovenia 7
Denmark 7
Italy 8
Russia (Moscow) 9
Romania 9
Lithuania 9
Ireland 9
Estonia 9
Czech Republic 9
Poland 11
Latvia 11
United Kingdom 12
United States 24
The Netherlands Data not available

0 5 10 15 20 25 30
Percentage
Figure 8
Proportion of 10th grade students who have used
any illicit drug other than marijuana/cannabis in their lifetime
by country