Taoiseach Bertie Ahern defended the Government's handling of the country's drug problem in the Dáil this morning.
Mr Ahern was responding to an accusation by Fine Gael leader Enda Kenny during Leader's Questions that drug-taking among young people was at crisis levels.
Mr Kenny was referring to a report published today showing that four out of ten teenagers have sampled drugs.
Taoiseach Bertie Ahern
The State of the Nation's Children Reportoutlines 50 different aspects of the lives of Irish children from 22 different data sources, including information from the Central Statistics Office, and surveys of young people across the country.
While much of the data is previously published, this is the first time that the information has been compiled into a single document.
Mr Ahern said the perception that Irish society is 'drug-ridden' was unfair to young people.
"The report shows that 40 per cent of young people have experimented with drugs. The key word is experimented. If you try one fag or try one drink it doesn't make you a smoker and drinker," he said.
Mr Ahern accused the Fine Gael leader of "twisting words" saying that young people may be sampling drink and drugs but that did not make them "winos or druggies".
"This report contains good news about children too. Irish children are ranked second in the world by the World Health Organisation for being physically active. You're going through the report trying to pick out negative things," he said.
The Taoiseach said great progress had been made in the last decade in dealing with the drug problem.