Community-Coalition On Drug Awareness

Marijuana is addictive. Of course, not everyone who smokes marijuana will become addicted—that depends on a whole bunch of factors— including your family history (genes), the age you start using, whether you also use other drugs, your family and peer relationships, success in school, and so on. Repeated marijuana use can lead to addiction—which means that people have trouble controlling their drug use and often cannot stop even though they want to.

Research shows that approximately 9 percent, or about 1 in 11, of those who use marijuana will become addicted. This rate increases to 17 percent, or about 1 in 6, if you start in your teens, and goes up to 25–50 percent among daily users.

Marijuana is unsafe if you are behind the wheel. Marijuana is the most common illegal drug involved in auto fatalities. It is found in the blood of around 14 percent of drivers who die in accidents, often in combination with alcohol or other drugs.

Marijuana affects a number of skills required for safe driving—alertness, concentration, coordination, and reaction time—so it’s not safe to drive high or to ride with someone who’s been smoking.

Marijuana makes it hard to judge distances and react to signals and sounds on the road. And combining marijuana with drinking even a small amount of alcohol greatly increases driving danger, more than either drug alone.

National Institute on Drug Abuse