According to the findings published in Addiction, the overall cannabis use soared from 13.9% to 15.4% during the study period.

The results were based on 51,052 responses from the Monitoring the Future (MTF) research, which is a nationally representative annual survey of teenagers in schools. The majority of participants (58.2%) had at least one parent with a college diploma and lived in a metropolitan statistical region (80.2%).

It further revealed that between 2017 and 2019, both regular and occasional cannabis vaping tripled among high school students, rising from 5% to 14%, while frequent and occasional cannabis use without vaping declined. A significant rise from 2.1 % in 2017 to 5.4 % in 2019 was seen in frequent cannabis usage involving vaping. However, frequent cannabis use without vaping reduced from 3.8 to 2.1 %, while occasional cannabis use fell from 6.9 to 4.4 % during the same time.

The surge in cannabis vaping is alarming because vaping devices can supply excessive amounts of tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) that could alternate tiers of intoxication, physiological effects, and the hazard of growing the risk of developing cannabis use disorder. Cannabis was strongly linked to the usage of other drugs. Nicotine usage and cannabis vaping had the strongest association (adjusted OR 42.28, 95 % CI 33.14-53.93).

Experts stated that the increased use of products such as cannabis raises the likelihood of addiction. (MedPage Today May 19, 2022)