Polling shows Kentucky ranks third in share of residents, 24.5 percent, who say they take mood-altering drugs every day

Kentucky is the place to be for mood-altering drugs. The state ranked third in a Gallup Organization study that asked 450 adults in each state how often they use drugs and
medications to affect their mood or relax them, Christopher Ingraham
reports for The Washington Post. West Virginia led, with 28.1 percent of respondents saying they use
mood-altering drugs every day, Rhode Island was second
at 25.9 percent, but Kentucky was not far behind at 24.5 percent.

Nationally, 18.9 percent of respondents said they take drugs almost every day, while 62.2 percent said they never do, 13.1 percent said they rarely do and 5 percent said they sometimes do.

The way the question was worded allows for errors, Ingraham writes. The
question asked about drugs and medications, but didn’t specify which
ones, and didn’t mention alcohol or tobacco. That left interpretation of
the question up to individual respondents.

A recent National Survey of Drug Use and Health
said that at least 71 percent of American adults drank in the past
year, and 56 percent drank in the past month, which if true, could raise
the rates in most states, if respondents were to consider alcohol a
mood-altering drug. (Read more) (To view this interactive Post map click here)