SURVEY: 10% OF AMERICANS ABUSE ALCOHOL, DRUGS

More than 1 in 10 Americans suffered from substance dependence or abuse of
illicit drugs, alcohol or both last year, according to a new government survey
released Friday.

The survey, based on interviews with more than 68,000 respondents age 12 or
older, estimated that 19.5 million people had used illegal drugs in the month
before being interviewed, 54 million had engaged in binge drinking and 15.9
million considered themselves heavy drinkers.

The vast majority of people with substance disorders - 94 percent - said they
did not think they needed treatment. The report by the Substance Abuse and
Mental Health Services Administration indicated that 7.7 million people needed
treatment for a drug problem and another 18.6 million needed help to battle
alcohol, yet only 1.4 million and 1.5 million, respectively, had received
treatment.

"A denial gap of over 94 percent is intolerable," said John Walters, director
of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy. "People need to
understand the addictive nature of drugs and not presume that they are all
right when everyone around them knows better." Moreover, the report found that
nearly 350,000 people who realized they needed treatment for drug or alcohol
abuse were unable to get treatment, a number Walters said would be cut
considerably if Congress approved the additional $200 million a year President
Bush is seeking for treatment programs starting next year.

The survey, done periodically since 1972, and every year since 1991, underwent
a number of technical and substantive changes in 2002, including paying
participants $30 for answering the questions and using tighter quality controls
for survey takers. As a result, responses about all types of drug use and abuse
were higher than for 2001, and officials cautioned against making direct
comparisons.

"We think that the higher numbers are largely because of the change in survey
methods, not because there has been any sudden change in trends of behaviors,"
said Charles Curie, head of the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services
Administration.

Illegal drug use is highest among adults 18 to 25 years old, with more than 20
percent using them in the past month. Among those ages 12 to 17, the rate was
11.6 percent.

The report noted a continued increase in the number of teens and young adults
who had "ever used" marijuana and cocaine. Marijuana is still the most commonly
used illicit drug, with 14.6 million people smoking it in 2002, although the
number of teens younger than 18 who started using the drug declined from 2.1
million in 2000 to 1.7 million in 2001.

The second-most-popular category of drug use after marijuana was the
non-medical use of prescription drugs. An estimated 6.2 million people - 2.6
percent of the population aged 12 or older - were current users of prescription
drugs taken without a medical reason. Of these, an estimated 4.4 million used
narcotic pain relievers and 1.8 million used anti-anxiety medications.

One positive note from the survey was that among those younger than 18, the
number of new daily smokers decreased from about 3,000 per day in 2000 to about
2,000 per day in 2001.

Overall, the survey found that 30 percent of the population 12 or older, 71.5
million people, use tobacco, mainly cigarettes.

Among other highlights:

About 10.7 million people ages 12 to 20 (28.8 percent of this age group)
reported drinking alcohol in the month before the interview. And the survey
found that 33.5 million people of all ages had driven a car under the influence
of alcohol at least once in the 12 months before the interview; - More than 83
percent of those ages 12-17 reported having seen or heard alcohol-or
drug-prevention messages outside of school in the past year. They indicated a
slightly lower past-month use of an illicit drug, about 2 percent less, than
those who had not seen or heard anti-drug messages; - There are 4 million
adults who have both a substance-use disorder and serious mental illness. An
estimated 17.5 million adults age 18 or older had serious mental illness. That
was 8.3 percent of all adults. Adults who used illicit drugs were more than
twice as likely to have serious mental illness as adults who did not use an
illicit drug.