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Illicit Drug use in Metropolitan and Non-Metropolitan Areas

NCJ Number
197996
Date Published
August 2002
Length
4 pages
Annotation
This document discusses the results of a national drug use survey analyzed by the type of county in which the respondents live.
Abstract
The National Household Survey on Drug Abuse (NHSDA) asked respondents age 12 or older to report use of any illicit drug during the 12 months prior to the survey. The illicit drugs referred to include marijuana/hashish, cocaine and crack, inhalants, hallucinogens, heroin, or prescription-type drugs used non-medically. For this report, large metropolitan areas have a population of one million or more, and small metropolitan areas have a population of less than one million. Counties in non-metropolitan areas are classified based on the number of people in the county that live in an urbanized area. Urbanized counties have 20,000 or more population in urbanized areas, less urbanized counties have at least 2,500 but less than 20,000 population in urbanized areas, and completely rural counties have fewer than 2,500 population in urbanized areas. Results show that, in 2000, individuals that lived in metropolitan areas were more likely than those in non-metropolitan areas to have used an illicit drug during the past year. Persons in non-metropolitan areas were more likely than those in metropolitan areas to report that marijuana was fairly or very easy to obtain. Persons living in non-metropolitan areas were more likely to perceive a great risk of smoking marijuana once or twice a week compared with those in metropolitan areas. 3 figures, 2 tables, 4 endnotes