Forty-nine percent of high school seniors have tried marijuana, why is the number so high? It is because of the lack of programs that are informing America's youth of the harmful things that marijuana can do to you personally, mentally, and socially. It is becoming more and more popular with the population of today's youth.
             Marijuana is the most commonly used illicit drug or "street drug". Marijuana is also known as bud, dope, and weed. It is a greenish plant that is dried and smoked in many different ways. Smokers make weed cigarettes (joints), smoke from a pipe, or even a bong (a vase like device that uses water). It contains the drug THC (delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol), which gives you the feeling known as a "high". The higher the THC content the more intense "high" a smoker receives. This feeling makes you sleepy, hungry and even paranoid of your surroundings. Then you get what every drug has and that is the side effects. These effects include: problems with memory and learning, distorted perception, difficulty in thinking and problem solving, loss of coordination, increased heart rate, and anxiety.
             Wouldn't these effects listed scare off potential users? It doesn't seem that way. The National Household Survey on Drug Abused released a survey that so dramatic numbers of teens and young adult using the drug more and more. The numbers say that youth from ages 12 to 17, 10.8 percent were current users of the
             drug; for adults 18 to 25, use had risen to 18.9 percent. Secretary of Health Tommy Thompson said, "One of the most disturbing findings of the survey is that marijuana use has gone up, and the perception is that it is not harmful." That is the main reason for the wide spread use of this street drug. The study, What America's Users Spend on Illegal Drugs, reports that in 2000 Americans spent an estimated
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