Daily marijuana usage has surpassed the number of people who say they drink just as often. These results appear as the shift in the everyday view of recreational marijuana becomes more mainstream across the United States, and legal in nearly half of them.
An analysis of national survey data estimated that nearly 18 million people reported using marijuana daily. This contrasts against the nearly 15 million who reported drinking daily. These statistics mark the first time that marijuana usage outnumbered daily, or even near-daily, drinking.
Jonathan Caulkins—a policy researcher at Carnegie Mellon University—has stated that “A good 40% of current cannabis users are using it daily or near daily, a pattern that is more associated with tobacco use than typical alcohol use.”
This research, which is based on data from the National Survey of Drug Use and Health, appeared in the journal Addiction on May 22. The conducted survey is a highly regarded source of self-repotted estimates of not just tobacco, but alcohol and drug usage in the United States.
From 1992 to 2022, the per capita rate of reporting daily or even near-daily marijuana use increased 15-fold. Caulkins has acknowledged that those participating in the study may be more willing to report marijuana use as the public acceptance of it grows, which may have caused the boost in the increase.
Marijuana remains illegal at the federal level even though it is allowed for medical or even recreational usage in many states. Voters in Florida will have a chance to decide on a constitutional amendment that will allow recreational cannabis usage to be legalized.
Doctor David A. Gorelick, a professor of psychiatry at the University of Maryland School of Medicine, stated that heavy users of marijuana are more likely to become addicted. He also noted that this increase in daily usage suggests that even more people are at risk of developing problems or even cannabis addiction.
“High-frequency use also increases the risk of developing cannabis-associated psychosis,” he stated—which is a severe condition where a person loses touch with reality.
Doctor Brook Worster, who is the chief medical officer at EO Care, a medicinal cannabis firm, has stated that there was an increase in usage for a variety of reasons. “Taking away the taboo,” she says, has led to more people openly reporting that they use the drug.
She stated: “The rates have not changed as dramatically as the survey indicates.” This, she claims, is due to the fact that “People don’t feel as scared to admit they’re using it.”
Per a study by Pew Research, 74% of Americans live in states where medical or recreational uses of marijuana are illegal, while 54% live in states where recreational use is legal. Trends in consumption from 1979 to 2022 have corresponded with restricting or expanding marijuana use—and as the Biden administration moves to reclassify the substance as less dangerous under federal law, the rates of self-reported data in reports could continue to change. However, Caulkins notes that “changes in actual use have been considerable.”
