BOSTON (WBZ-AM) -- As recreational marijuana is about to officially become legal in the Commonwealth, a new study sounds an alarm on how many people admit to driving under the influence of pot.
The report from the State Department of Public Health says about one in three Massachusetts residents who use marijuana say they have driven while high. More than 34 percent said they'd driven at least one after getting high, while 11 percent of all adults reported having been in a car driven by a person who had used marijuana in the last 30 days.
Public Health Investigator Mark Mascorella, who worked on the survey, talked about it with WBZ NewsRadio 1030's Shari Small.
"It's higher than we typically would have envisioned before conducting this study," he said. "It's important to note that this is a baseline study, and it's using a study design that hasn't been deployed previously. So we're still looking to see to what extent the findings from this are consistent with other surveys."
In all, about 21 percent of those surveyed said they had used marijuana within the last 30 days, with the highest proportion of users between ages 18 and 25. Lawmakers called for the study as they made revisions last year to the state's voter-approved recreational marijuana law.
You can view the rest of the results of the study here on the DPH website.
WBZ NewsRadio 1030's Shari Small (@ShariSmallNews) reports