Statistics
In 2009, 23.5 million persons aged 12 or older needed treatment for an illicit drug or alcohol use problem (9.3 percent of persons aged 12 or older). Of these, 2.6 million (1.0 percent of persons aged 12 or older and 11.2 percent of those who needed treatment) received treatment at a specialty facility. Thus, 20.9 million persons (8.3 percent of the population aged 12 or older) needed treatment for an illicit drug or alcohol use problem but did not receive treatment at a specialty substance abuse facility in the past year. These estimates are similar to the estimates for 2008 and for 2002.
Among youths aged 12 to 17, there were 1.1 million (4.5 percent) who needed treatment for an illicit drug use problem in 2009. Of this group, only 115,000 received treatment at a specialty facility (10.5 percent of youths aged 12 to 17 who needed treatment), leaving 983,000 youths who needed treatment but did not receive it at a specialty facility.
Among people aged 12 or older who needed but did not receive illicit drug use treatment and felt they needed treatment (based on 2006-2009 combined data), the most often reported reasons for not receiving treatment were (a) no health coverage and could not afford cost (40.5 percent), (b) not ready to stop using (31.6 percent), (c) concern that receiving treatment might cause neighbors/community to have negative opinion (15.8 percent), (d) not knowing where to go for treatment (13.5 percent), (e) possible negative effect on job (13.2 percent), and (f) being able to handle the problem without treatment (10.4 percent).