What in the World Are Millennials Smoking?

Risk-taking by teens continues to decline, from carrying guns to school to not wearing seatbelts. That’s according to the 2011 results of the CDC’s National Youth Risk Behavior Survey (YRBS). The latest drops in alcohol and tobacco use are especially striking. The percentage of high school students who have drunk alcohol in the past 30 days decreased from 41.8 percent in 2009 to 38.7 percent in 2011. That number has come all the way down from 50.0 percent in 1999. The prevalence of smoking in the past 30 days also continued to fall, from 19.5 percent in 2009 to 18.1 percent in 2011. That figure has fallen by half since 1997.

The magnitude of this decline in alcohol and tobacco use is underscored by the newest report from the European School Survey Project on Alcohol and Other Drugs (ESPAD), which shows that U.S. youth now use both substances far less than European youth. ESPAD surveys European teens in 36 countries using the same methodology as the University of Michigan’s Monitoring the Future (MTF) survey, allowing us to compare rates of substance use between the two continents. The 2010 comparisons are eye-opening: In Europe, 57 percent of high schoolers report having consumed alcohol in the past 30 days—and 39 percent report having “five or more drinks on at least one occasion”—more than…