International Statistics

22% of inhalant abusers who died had no history of previous inhalant abuse.

Inhalant abuse is a problem that affects countries around the world.

• In one year alone in the United States, 2.4 million people used some form of inhalant within a year. About 6 percent of current American 8th graders reported inhalant use.
• According to research into Medical Examiner reports, there are over 500 inhalant-caused deaths in the US annually.
• Inhalant abuse is one of the most common forms of drug abuse in the 11–15 age group in England and Wales. It is estimated that 3.5–10 percent of young people have at least experimented with volatile solvents, and that 15,000–30,000 are current users.
• In the United Kingdom, 39 percent of inhalant-related deaths occurred on the victim’s first attempt.
• In Australia, 33 percent of inhalant users consumed these substances more frequently than other drugs—at least monthly.

In Karachi, Pakistan, 80 to 90% of street kids sniff glue or solvents.

• Research on substance abuse among children living on the streets in various countries shows that 47 percent were lifetime users of inhalants. Some 58 percent of street children in Kenya reported sniffing glue in the past month.
• In a study of more than 22,000 cases of inhalant poisonings treated in hospital emergency rooms, about 10 percent of the patients ended up in intensive care and another 8 percent were referred to psychiatric units.
• According to the European School Survey Project on Alcohol and Other Drugs, which gathers data from students in 35 European countries, 7.2 percent of the students have tried inhalants at least once. The countries with the highest proportions of students who tried inhalants were Latvia (16 percent), Germany and Croatia (15 percent each).

Updated: 2025