Study: Americans Are Using More Cannabis and Tobacco, Especially Older Adults

A study published August 13 in the Addictive Behaviors journal found that the co-use of cannabis and tobacco products by Americans has increased over the last two decades.

The study, outlined in a recent report by Duke University School of Medicine, utilized data from 708,891 adult respondents to the U.S. National Survey on Drug Use and Health from the years 2002-2021. Duke researchers assessed the prevalence among Americans of past 30-day cannabis and tobacco use, exclusive cannabis use, and exclusive tobacco use.

The number of American adults who use both cannabis and tobacco products has increased significantly since 2002 with the increase driven largely by rising rates of overall cannabis use. The prevalence of co-use of cannabis and tobacco particularly increased among older Americans, especially people aged 26-34 and those aged 50 and older. Co-use rates have dropped only for young adults aged 18-25, whose co-use rates stagnated from 2002-2014 and then dropped significantly from 2014-2019.

As of 2021, “the weighted prevalence of cannabis and tobacco co-use was 6.38 %, the weighted prevalence of exclusive cannabis use was 7.28 %, and the weighted prevalence of exclusive tobacco use was 15.01%,” the authors wrote.

“When looking at the 2021 data, younger individuals, people with lower educational attainment and residing in a state with a medical marijuana law, were most likely to report co-use. Trends in cannabis and tobacco co-use prevalence have not been examined in many years while regulatory policy has been changing quite a bit.” — Study lead author Dana Rubenstein, in a statement

Researchers also noted that exclusive cannabis use has been on the rise since 2007 while exclusive tobacco use has declined since 2002.