A new survey from Rise Above Colorado shows encouraging signs for the state's youth, finding that attitudes toward prescription drug misuse have become less permissive and that awareness of the presence and dangers of fentanyl has increased sharply.
One high point among many: The share of teens who said prescription drugs are safer than illegal drugs fell from 27% in 2024 — the last survey — to 16% this year.
"We saw some significant increases in perception of risk of using opioid prescription drugs misuse declining. Attitudes that prescription drugs are safer than illegal drugs. People really recognizing some of those key factors. So what we're doing there is really working," Kent MacLennan said.
MacLennan is the executive director of Rise Above Colorado. He said he was encouraged by the findings.
The survey, funded in part by the CDPHE and the state attorney general's office, interviewed about 700 12-to-17-year-olds between April and June. It is the 10th statewide survey conducted by Rise Above. Rise Above Colorado is a substance misuse prevention organization that empowers youth to make healthy decisions.
The 2026 findings reveal meaningful progress in several areas of youth substance-use prevention. Compared with 2024, youth are less curious about trying every historically measured substance, report fewer direct offers of marijuana, alcohol, and prescription drugs, and perceive unprescribed prescription drugs as more difficult to obtain. Attitudes toward prescription misuse have become substantially less permissive, while awareness and perceived risk of fentanyl, counterfeit pills, and prescription pain relievers have increased sharply. Youth are also more willing to intervene when a friend may be at risk and more confident refusing a vape offered by someone close to them.
These findings suggest that prevention messages are reaching youth — especially when the danger is concrete, potentially catastrophic, and clearly connected to overdose.
When asked whether he was encouraged overall by the survey, MacLennan pointed to gains beyond substance use.
"Yeah. I really was. I think the difference that we saw in the last two years particularly around the opioid space. We also saw some really significant news around sense of belonging. More youth felt connected in their schools and with their friends than they did two years ao. And that's an important protective factor for young people that helps keep them safe," MacLennan said.
Those gains have not yet translated into broad declines in current substance use. Past-30-day prescription-drug misuse is lower, but alcohol and vaping remain significantly above their 2022 levels and statistically unchanged from 2024. Marijuana use is comparatively stable.
At the same time, youth appear to be drawing an increasingly sharp distinction between substances they understand as dangerous drugs and those they experience as familiar parts of adolescent life. As the risks of fentanyl, counterfeit pills, and prescription misuse become clearer, alcohol, marijuana, vaping, and nicotine pouches may feel comparatively safer — not because youth consider them harmless, but because they are socially visible, accessible, and easier to imagine using occasionally.
Youth may recognize their risks without experiencing those risks as immediate enough to outweigh belonging, curiosity, stress relief, or social participation.
The broader picture of youth well-being is similarly mixed. Friend support, acceptance at school, access to trusted adults, parental support, and commitment to personal goals are generally strong and often improved in 2026. Self-reported mental health also remains better than in 2022. Yet schoolwork feels substantially less meaningful, poor sleep has increased, and more youth report living with someone experiencing depression or another mental-health problem.
Their open-ended comments describe lives organized around academic pressure, competing demands, uncertainty about the future, social comparison, and the challenge of belonging without losing oneself. Substances rarely appear as the first problem youth name; for some youth, they may instead represent one of the available ways to manage lives already carrying other pressures.
This helps explain why correcting perceived peer norms remains useful but is not sufficient. Youth do overestimate how common substance use is, and reducing the belief that "everyone is doing it" may lessen social pressure. But those estimates also communicate something real about visibility: a behavior can be used by a minority and still feel pervasive within a school, friendship group, or digital environment.
This story was reported on-air by a journalist and has been converted to this platform with the assistance of AI. Our editorial team verifies all reporting on all platforms for fairness and accuracy.
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