WASHINGTON — The last year has seen a sharp rise in the number of youths ages 12 to 17 who say friends or classmates have used cocaine, heroin or LSD, according to a poll conducted for a respected drug abuse organization.
The National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University said the poll found that 56% of the youths surveyed said they knew someone using at least one of those three hard drugs, an increase from 39% in 1996.
The increase was greatest among 12-year-olds, with 23.5% saying friends or fellow students used the hard drugs--more than double the 10.6% level last year.
Researchers also found that preteens are smoking cigarettes, drinking alcohol and smoking marijuana at earlier ages and that adolescents who abuse these "gateway drugs" run a higher risk of abusing harder drugs in the future.
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The survey was conducted for the center's Commission on Substance Abuse Among America's Adolescents, which was created two years ago after a study found that substance abuse trends among college students are rooted in behavior beginning in middle school.
The commission said the apparent rise in drug use suggests that parents, clergy and educators must be more vigilant in the fight against drugs.
"While we are happy about President Clinton's decision to focus the war on drugs on the youth . . . this battle is going to be won across the kitchen tables, the church pews and the schoolyards," said Joseph A. Califano Jr., president of the center and former secretary of the Department of Health, Education and Welfare.
The commission also analyzed data from research by other organizations, concluding, among other things:
* Teens start smoking younger, with ages 11 and 12 now the peak time when youngsters first experiment with cigarettes.
* Among eighth-graders, binge drinking (consuming five or more drinks in one sitting) rose from 12.9% in 1992 to 15.6% in 1996.
* Heroin use among eighth-graders doubled between 1991 and 1996, to 2.4%. This figure matched a report released last week by the Department of Health and Human Services. That report indicated a sharp increase in teen heroin use.
The HHS report also showed that marijuana use may be leveling off among teens. But Califano said that conclusion is no cause for celebration because, while 1996 did not see increases in overall marijuana use among adolescents, teens are trying the drug at earlier ages. In 1996, for example, 12.7% of eighth-graders said they had used marijuana in seventh grade or earlier, up from 7.7% in 1992.
