Cigarette smoking in teens down to 15.7 percent, CDC says

Cigarette smoking in high school students has reached its lowest percentage since 1991.

In 2013, 15.7 percent of high school students said to be smoking cigarettes, as oppose to 36.4 percent in the peak year of 1997, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Image from Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

This means the government has reached its goal of getting teen cigarette smoking down to 16 percent or less by 2020.

"I think the bottom line is that our teens are choosing health," CDC director Tom Frieden said, USA Today reports.

Among the healthy choices is the reduction in drinking sodas. In 2007, 34 percent of students were drinking at least one soda daily. In 2013, it dropped down to 27 percent.

In 2013, 32 percent of students watched three hours of television daily, down from 43 percent in 1999. Although, the reduction in numbers seemed to just shift to computer use. Forty-four percent of students were on the computer for three hours or more daily for non-school purposes, skyrocketing from 22 percent in 2003.

Although the number of sexually active students has slightly declined to 34 percent from 38 percent in 1991, so has the number of those active using condoms, declining to 59 percent compared to 63 in 2003.

The government is still aiming to decrease the use of cigar and smokeless tobacco by teens, which remains stagnant in numbers. Hookah and e-cig use has also increased.