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Tobacco Use Among Middle and High School Students — United States, 1999

January 28, 2000 / Vol. 49 / No. 3


A new national study conducted and released by the American Legacy Foundation in collaboration with the CDC Foundation, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is the first-ever study to measure the prevalence of current tobacco use among middle school students and to document the emergence of bidis (or beedies) and kreteks use (also called clove cigarettes) among middle and high school students. The National Youth Tobacco Survey was conducted from September through October 1999 and found that 12.8 percent of middle school students and 34.8 percent of high school students currently use some form of tobacco (cigarettes, smokeless, cigars, pipes, bidis, or kreteks). This and other national studies have shown that African American high school students smoked at much lower rates than other students; however, the NYTS found that current cigarette smoking prevalence among African American middle school students (9.0 percent) was similar to white (8.8 percent) and Hispanic (11.0 percent) middle school students. This finding, if supported by future surveys, may be an early indication that the differences in smoking rates between African American and white students may be disappearing. The differing patterns of tobacco product use across racial/ethnic groups require further research.

The study also found the following:

  • About one in 10 (9.2 percent) middle school students and more than a quarter (28.4 percent) of high school students were current cigarette smokers.
     
  • Cigar use was the second most preferred tobacco product used by middle and high school students. Among middle school students 6.1 percent reported smoking cigars in the past month. African American middle school students (8.8 percent) were significantly more likely to smoke cigars than white students (4.9 percent). Cigar use among high school students was 15.3 percent. An estimated one in 5 male students (20.3 percent) had used cigars compared to about one in 10 female students (10.2 percent).
     
  • Current use of novel tobacco products, such as bidi and kretek cigarettes, is an emerging public health problem among young people in the United States. The use of bidis (5.0 percent) and kreteks (5.8 percent) among high school students nearly equaled the use of smokeless tobacco (6.6 percent).

Tobacco Use Among Middle and High School Students — United States, 1999 49(3) January 28, 2000
(PDF LogoPDF-339K)

Tobacco Use Among Middle and High School Students — National Youth Tobacco Survey 1999MMWR Highlights

Current* Cigarette Smoking Among Middle and High School Students by Race/Ethnicity—National Youth Tobacco Survey, 1999 — Graph

Current* Use Among Middle and High School Students by Type of Tobacco Product—National Youth Tobacco Survey, 1999 — Graph

One or more documents on this Web page is available in Portable Document Format (PDF). You will need Acrobat Reader (a free application) to view and print these documents.



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This page last reviewed March 03, 2003

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