Results from the European Study Task on Alcohol and Other Drugs (ESPAD) combined with those from the U.S. Monitoring the Future Study revealed that American teenagers have high rates of illicit substance abuse when compared with European teens. Typically, 18 percent of European students had actually used an illicit drug in their life times, compared to 35 percent of U.S.Given that 1999, the number of drug overdose deaths including opioids in the U.S. has actually quadrupled, totaling over a half a million deaths throughout that duration. While we now know more than ever about the threats of substance abuse, it appears that this knowledge has actually stopped working to act as a deterrent.