STUDY COMPARES VICES OF U.S., EUROPEAN TEENS

American teenagers are far more likely than their European peers to use
marijuana and other illicit drugs, a recent study says.

The study compared the results of 1999 surveys answered anonymously by
10th-grade students in the United States and 30 European countries.

Among the European students, 37 percent had smoked at least one cigarette
in the previous 30 days, compared with 26 percent in the United States.
Sixty-one percent of the European 10th-graders had consumed alcohol in the
previous 30 days, compared with 40 percent of the students in the United
States.

Forty-one percent of 10th-graders in the United States had tried marijuana,
compared with 17 percent of those in Europe. And 23 percent of the students
in the United States had used other illicit drugs, compared with 6 percent
of Europeans.