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Iceland radically cut teenage drug use
- coretx 7y agoIceland has a population of 364,260. Changing the behavior of just one group of teens would lead to "radically" different numbers. Especially considering the fact that the bulk is concentrated at the capital Reykjavík. Herefor numbers regarding Iceland should always be interpreted with great caution since they are likely not projectable onto other countries.
- HarryHirsch 7y agothe bulk is concentrated at the capital Reykjavík That's the point, isn't it? You'd think that Reykjavik as the capital has resources and money that are not available in Aberdeen, SD or Americus, GA. In the US, the countryside has been systematically hollowed out.
- loufe 7y agoIt's a good point though I content that it depends on what you mean. I'd argue that there are measures which are enforcable and feasible on a small scale which may be far less so on a larger scale (ex: the USA) due as much to politics as anything else. I don't think there's any reason to same the same measures, were they applied likewise elsewhere, would not be as effective.
- ksdale 7y agoI interpreted the parent's comment to mean that it could just be an artifact of the small size of the country. After all, there are almost certainly cities in the US where hundreds of teenagers have recently decided not to do drugs, but it wouldn't impact national statistics at all. If hundreds of teenagers in Reykjavik decide not to do drugs, it looks like they have "solved" the problem.
- AstralStorm 7y agoOn the other hand, why not at least try out the approach? (Including the nasty curfew.) Is USA so poor they cannot get $250 in to send teens to do extracurriculars/sports? Iceland is not exactly super rich.
- coretx 7y agoIceland might very well be the richest country (Non city /oil state) in the world per capita. Measured both in monetary and non monetary terms. See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Iceland https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Iceland
- lonelappde 7y agoCurfew does happen from time to time in pockets across the US. And it does work.
- econcon 7y agoI think bigger issue these days is anabolic steroid abuse which goes unnoticed. And only few people die from it, but it might lead to greater health care cost as most abusers die from cardiac issues young, 30s or 40s. In many countries, it's pushed underground but they aren't hard to acquire like hard drugs. There should be companies searching for safer compounds which help achieve same results without any of the long term risks.
- Mountain_Skies 7y agoWouldn't dying in your 30s or 40s allow you to avoid the elderly years when you rack up the most health care expenses?
- lonelappde 7y agoIt also cuts off productive working years.
- jonnypotty 7y agoIf you killed yourself at 10 you could avoid the difficult teenage years too.
- Kaiyou 7y agoHow do "few people die from it" and "most abusers die [...] young, 30s or 40s" fit together?
- Talanes 7y agoA few people die from it, and most of them die young. Facts presented after a preposition should generally be read within the context of the preposition, not as independent phrases.
- Kaiyou 7y agoIf only a few people, like three out of twenty million die from it, then their age doesn't matter.
- michalu 7y agoIceland has a population of a provincial town. I noticed it's often featured in news headlines as some sort of an example in relation to other countries this fact being omitted.
- praptak 7y agoYeah, small population size creates fake outliers. "Rural states have both the highest and the lowest rate of kidney cancer" - what they in fact have is small populations, so they just have much larger variance.
- lonelappde 7y agoIt's not "just". Cancer isn't purely random on its own authority. It has causes. Variance could be due variation in environment, pollution, personal habits, quality of record keeping, and many other meaningful or spurious causes. Outliers and 95%iles are worth studying, not merely writing off. Iceland's models might not work for larger countries due to size difference, and might not work for other cities due to differences in sovereignty structure, but it's worth investigating.
- cortesoft 7y agoWhile the data might not be ‘just’ caused by random variance, it provides little evidence that there is something more going on than just randomness. You have no particular reason to study those cases more than anything else, since the data we have does not suggest that there is anything actually going on.
- wolco 7y agoThings are not as simple as one or the other. The uneven spread of heavy industry creates pockets where cancer rates are higher becausw of environmental factors. Random variance is responsible at a micro-level but at a macro level the trend still holds true.
- pvaldes 7y agoMaybe tenageers changed old standard drugs by digital adictions...
- dqpb 7y agoI would rather my teenager have a digital addiction than a drug addiction.
- Nursie 7y agoI think I'd rather mine used drugs socially (and infrequently) and had a social life.... Both of these answers are overly simplistic however.
- Proziam 7y agoSurely this depends on the drug?
- Nursie 7y agoIndeed, and how often/under what circumstances. Gaming can be perfectly a healthy hobby as well, when not done to the exclusion of all else.
- Razengan 7y agoYou can have a social life while having a "digital addiction", with fewer risks to your health than a drug addiction, social or not.
- smabie 7y agoI would contend that video games, cell phones, etc have made a bigger difference than anything else.
- quijoteuniv 7y agoIs interesting how americans have the need of discrediting iceland & scandinavia in general. You can read that between the lines of the comments. Really great countries to live, people gets a real chance at developing their potential.This article is an example of that.
- vikramkr 7y agoWe're not discrediting it because it's Scandinavia, we're discrediting it because iceland has a miniscule population and actual effects of interventions are difficult to meaningfully tease out from chance on this scale. I looked it up, and I'm unsure if in reading this right, but Iceland has 360,000 people? That's it? If I'm not reading that wrong, my small suburb of ny has 1% of the population of the entire country - and size effects matter in terms of how easy strategies are to implement and whether changes are from natural variance or real fundamental progress.
- AstralStorm 7y agoI find it more curious if there won't be sequelae such as overweight rates going up instead. That would be interesting. Iceland is not that small. It's comparable to many medium sized cities in Europe, or a district of a big one.
- vikramkr 7y agoYou're comparing a country to medium sized cities though - on a continent with a population of 750 million people, versus a country like America with 350 million, it's like 350 thousand. What small City governments can do and how they govern is different from alrger cities like NY, different again from states and from the monster of the federal government or the European union
- robocat 7y ago> we're discrediting it because iceland has a miniscule population So find one or more groups of 360,000 people in your country and start testing it on small parts of your population. Don’t just ignore the findings because you can’t apply it to your whole country at once (which is a bad idea anyway: e.g. some nation-wide education changes at home have been big mistakes).
- nabla9 7y agoSince Nordic countries are very similar in many ways, Finnish social scientists specializing on youth recently visited Iceland in attempt to learn about the system and wrote a report about it (in Finnish) https://www.nuorisotutkimusseura.fi/nakokulma53 https://www.nuorisotutkimusseura.fi/nakokulma53 Summary: * They didn't find any clear Icelandic model. Icelandic politicians promoting it. Icelandic researchers don't know if it exists. * Icelandic experts are not unanimous that there is causal link between the advertised methods and effects. Halldór Hauksson has noted that increasing the age of adulthood with two years might have been the real cause. Many young people having problems stayed within the children programs and could be treated under them and not as adult alcoholics. * It's very adult oriented model. Teenagers are just subjects. * There was clear distrust against unsupervised gatherings among teenagers. Adults don't seem to see any value or learning in stuff that young people do among themselves. * Nobody have studied what teenagers think about the system. Apparently they didn't even think to ask it. * There are parts of the system that might violate agreements that protect children rights. (Yes, Nordic countries take things like United Nations Declaration of the Rights of the Child seriously) Some methods violate Finnish constitution of equality and equal rights (when people are subject to government actions they must have an opportunity to voice their opinion) so they can't be directly used. If you look at other things like alcohol use, things don't look good. * Teenage suicides have grown off the chart. Boys: 42.5 suicides per 100k. For comparison Finland 12, Sweden 8.5, Norway 6.5, Denmark 5.5 * Psychotropic medication among teenagers if many times what it is in other Nordic countries. UN children rights commission has notified Iceland about child medication.
- Funes- 7y agoIt's almost as if even nonprofits were interested in furthering their own agenda instead of rigorously seeking the truth in order to inform people. Great comment, by the way. Thank you for the summary.
- hans1729 7y ago> If you look at other things like alcohol use, things don't look good. What? Why is alcohol not regarded as a drug in this kind of research environment? Is the aim of this research to save teenagers from drug abuse, or is the aim to have lower numbers of illegal-drug-abuse? Overall, this seems questionable at best. Not letting teenagers spending unsupervised time surely has ripple effects in most, if not all, areas of society, the most of which I'd consider highly undesirable (not granting autonomy leads to severe psychological issues down the line)
- sebastianconcpt 7y agoBy 1992, his team in Denver had won a $1.2 million government grant to form Project Self-Discovery, which offered teenagers natural-high alternatives to drugs and crime. They got referrals from teachers, school nurses and counsellors, taking in kids from the age of 14 who didn’t see themselves as needing treatment but who had problems with drugs or petty crime. “We didn’t say to them, you’re coming in for treatment. We said, we’ll teach you anything you want to learn: music, dance, hip hop, art, martial arts.” The idea was that these different classes could provide a variety of alterations in the kids’ brain chemistry, and give them what they needed to cope better with life: some might crave an experience that could help reduce anxiety, others may be after a rush.
- RocketSyntax 7y agoAt 300,000 people and 8 political parties - the people still kind of ARE the state.
- bbarn 7y agoThey are an incredibly homogenous people as well, so generally, most are in favor of the same types of social programs, as they almost all benefit from them. Income inequality is incredibly low, some of the best in the world. So yes, most of the ruling class are the people.
- mnm1 7y agoCompare this to growing up as a teenager in suburbia. I could not play any sports, despite wanting to very badly. My neighborhood had few kids, spread in housing developments that stretched for miles. I loved basketball but there were no courts anywhere. My parents worked till 5, so I did not have someone to pick me up after school activities. I had zero after school activities my entire life. This was in one of the richest, "best" (that means whitest) schools in NJ. I had a hoop at home and would play with my dad and sister sometimes. That's it. There was literally nothing else. Just coming home after school and locking myself in with my sister. Luckily we had each other. I read, taught myself programming, watched tv, etc. but nothing social. Maybe once a month or even less I could get a ride or my friend could get a ride and we could spend time hanging out. Otherwise it was just loneliness outside of school. I never got the opportunity to learn how to socialize with peers outside of school. I already had social anxiety. Almost suicidal. So of course, when I had that first drink and the first weed smoke, it was heaven. I thought drugs were the only way people socialized. I had finally discovered something that made it bearable. Addiction was inevitable. Of course, it was. Now, twenty years later I still have major issues socializing, still dealing with addiction, still dealing with anxiety, still isolating. Suburban USA was hell. I'm just lucky I don't enjoy opiates like my sister. I wouldn't wish this upon my worst enemy. Is it really a surprise that caring about children, giving them a chance to learn and enjoy activities together makes them not want to get high? That's what I'm doing now with my life, but it's hard to break old habits. I wish I could have played sports in my teens. I wish I could have done many things and learned to socialize and deal with feelings. I will never raise children in such a horrific environment as the US. I'd rather be childless.
- mschuster91 7y agoWho would have thought: yet another indicator that drugs of all kind (yes, including coffee!) are basically self-medication by people to deal with external stress. Happy to hear that there's an ever growing base of data to support this, but sadly acting upon that data is not exactly top priority for politicians :/
- smabie 7y agoThat's not true. A lot of people's stress is internal. And what's the difference anyways? The human condition is to suffer, get old, and die. Sounds to me like drugs are probably the most rational and logical thing you can do, besides suicide. I'm being a little bit of a downer, I know, but the reality of life is pretty terrible. Fortunately, me and most others can just ignore what life is about (most of the time) and carry on like anything we do makes a difference. Moreover, if politicians wanted to act upon it, they would just legalize all drugs and call it a day.
- mirimir 7y agoMaybe they just got better at hiding it.
- OliverJones 7y agoI volunteer at a drop-in center for kids at a local public housing project. For what it's worth, we've started springing for music, dance, martial-arts lessons for our teens. These are the kids who can't afford the fees for school sports, and who don't have reliable ways to get around (parents with cars). It's making a big difference. We're facepalming for not starting to use our budget for this purpose sooner. These young are getting more engaged with school. We explicitly avoid taking surveys about substance type stuff, so it's hard to know for sure how much a difference it makes. Plus the program is too young. (We don't take surveys because "n" is too small to ensure anonymity and the kids know it. We have a "no judgement ethic to uphold.) But the kind of stuff suggested in this article seems to work so far. My purpose in working with these kids is convincing some of them "do your math homework, and you'll get a good job. It's your ticket out of housing."
- tomcam 7y agoWould love to hear more about this. Do you have a blog or something? Where is the center located?
- d_burfoot 7y ago> Milkman’s doctoral dissertation concluded that people would choose either heroin or amphetamines depending on how they liked to deal with stress. Heroin users wanted to numb themselves; amphetamine users wanted to actively confront it. This seems kind of silly in retrospect. In the US, most heroin users chose heroin because they got addicted to prescription painkillers, and heroin has a similar effect while being much cheaper.
- jonnypotty 7y agoLoads of my friends deal with stress by actively confronting it and none like numbing themselves..weird. Its almost like they chose amphetamines cos raving on herion doesn't really work.
- donnaru 7y agoHi, person from Iceland here. Drug use has actually been going up since these numbers were reported. It's true that alcohol use went down compared to the decades before but you must understand teenage drinking was so common. It's the only thing teenagers used to do for years and years. For us to get these numbers down is groundbreaking yes but drinking is still a huge problem for Iceland and drugs kind of just took over from alcohol. It's true though that the increased focus in activity such as sports etc does actually work. As soon as the city allowed people to use a sort of point system were they get x amounts of points per year which can be used for sports and such things got much better. This means poor families can also send their kids to activities which is really positive. Drugs in general are really popular now. The drug market in Iceland in general has been growing extremely fast over the past years and it's become really professional in terms of quality and delivery. We have a relatively small police force right now and the size of the drug market is way beyond their control. I just find it kind of misleading everytime I see these articles. It's true we got drinking down but in general Iceland deals with a lot of depression, a lot of suicides and a lot of narcotic related issues every year. We have a very high suicide rate per capita, especially for men. What I mean is that these articles express this like we got rid of the problem, we totally did not. The fact that the state gives credits for sport activities etc each year is an extremely positive thing though.
- lemmonii 7y agoAbsolutely, I was in an Icelandic elementary school about a decade ago. While i was in school i saw a general decline in anti-social behaviour, now in that same school i see a dramatic rise in anti-social behaviour (violence drugs & drug use) through my siblings.
- harry8 7y agoIceland. Population 300,000. Something to keep in mind.
- scotty79 7y agoIsn't gaming responsible for some fall in substance abuse just by giving kids something to do?