Not so long ago, I was a manager at a restaurant. While safety was a very important part of our daily routine, accidents did happen. This is true in any workplace – accidents happen. Any accident that requires medical attention also requires a urine drug screen in order for Worker’s Compensation to actually cover the injury. This happens no matter where you work (in the USA), no matter what kind of work you do, no matter what kind of environment you work in. Let’s examine this policy, shall we?
When someone starts a job, they are usually given some sort of orientation. One common practice is to make the employee feel as if they are safe, even if they suffer an accident. The employer lets them know that they should report even the tiniest of injuries and get it on file. What if it gets infected or has complications? So, a paper cut is something you are asked to report. Most people don’t report paper cuts, bruises, nicks, scrapes, bumps, or dings.
The employer may try to add to that warm, fuzzy feeling of security by letting the employee know that, should they suffer a more serious accident, they will drop everything and drive them to the hospital, themselves – if an emergency squad isn’t required. I find this practice very suspect for 2 reasons: liability and responsibility.
If something happens in a place of business that requires medical attention, an employer should be loath to take on the added liability of attempting to safely transport an injury victim. I mean, this isn’t your buddy rushing you to the ER after you slid in the mud and broke your arm. What could possibly make an employer act as if it is their responsibility to personally drive an injured employee to the hospital? What could possibly make an employer risk further complications to an injury by driving you themselves? The same employer was terribly concerned about your paper cut getting infected.
Drug testing. They want to make sure you are tested for drugs as soon as possible. Seriously, if they want to be certain the testing happens, let them follow the damn emergency squad. They will follow a squad if the injury was ‘that serious’. Too bad it is not out of 100% genuine concern for the victim…
What is wrong with drug testing? It’s bogus, that’s what. It is terribly flawed, on so many levels.
Say you are working in an office building and notice a ceiling tile that is starting to deteriorate. While you are pointing it out to another employee, construction on the next floor causes some dust to shake lose from the ceiling tile. Some of the dust gets in your eye. You blink, your eyes water, you rub, maybe you wash out your eye. A few hours later, you are still bothered by it and mention it to your boss. Your boss takes you to the emergency room where your eye is examined and treated. You are ordered to urinate in a cup. Your future has just been pissed away, so to speak – it certainly hangs on what some test results say.
The accident wasn’t your fault. It wasn’t because you went to a concert 3 weeks ago and sat sandwiched between 2 pot smokers, or because you smoked pot last night. It wasn’t because you decided to have the poppyseed dressing, or snorted cocaine last weekend. It wasn’t because you had a urinary tract infection, or ate pot brownies at a party a month ago. It wasn’t because you took an OTC cold remedy 2 days ago, or a sleeping pill 3 nights ago, or were on antibiotics last month. But, if you did any of those things, they could read positive for various illegal drugs.
If you come up positive, your claim will be denied and you will probably lose your job. You do not have to use any illegal drugs for a bottle of pee to say that you do. You do not have to be a chronic user for the test to think that you are. Too many things can effect the outcome of these tests. There are too many variables in what is actually tested.
I would be far more worried about working with someone who uses heroin than someone who smokes a joint or 3 with their buddies in the evening. I would be far more worried about working with someone who uses meth than someone who smoked weed over the weekend. I would be far more worried about working with someone who comes in smelling like they tied one on last night than someone who comes in reeking of pot smoke. Yet, every one of the ones I’d be worried about working with can easily avoid detection on a drug test (even a surprise, random test) by popping a few system cleansing tablets, and they are guaranteed to test ‘clean’ if they simply abstain for anywhere from just a few hours to as much as 72 hours.
On the other hand, the one who smokes marijuana, however infrequently, can be detected 30 days to a lifetime later. Take someone who used marijuana in college, put on a little more than the freshmen 15, and gained a few more pounds through the next 10 years or so. Marijuana’s naughty chemical is stored in fat cells. That same person has decided to lose weight, the great American passtime. This person burns off a few pounds of fat. Then, they see that damaged ceiling tile… It’s been 12 years since they touched the stuff, yet their burning fat cells are being flushed from their system, along with everything stored in the fat. They could test positive for marijuana.
I don’t really worry about working with a drug user – the bad ones weed themselves out, the good ones excel. I’d rather work with someone who was stoned on the job than someone who came in hungover!
Here’s a thought – let’s put breathalizers on the time clock. Before an employee can clock in or out, they must blow a clean breath test. Clean meaning 0.00, period. (For a very interesting article on the accuracy of breathalizers, click >here<)
There would be quite an uproar, me thinks. Especially if you just rinsed with mouthwash. We really think nothing of the hungover coworker, the breaktime nipper, or the lunchtime cocktails office manager. Do you really want one of these people to drive you to the hospital because you pointed out a broken ceiling tile?
A job that comes with inherent risks should be completely exempt from drug testing. (An example of this would be bench vice which comes with the inherent risk of getting slivers in the eye. It is a known and common risk – why should the employee be tested for drugs when doing their job is what got them hurt?) An accident that happens through no fault of your own should also be completely exempt. And, until there is a test that can determine how long ago someone used marijuana, it should be excluded from testing. If such a method were to ever be developed, it would have to exclude any and all use that is older than 72 hours. That’s the longest any other drug leaves traces in someone’s system – 72 hours.
A pot smoker can avoid smoking for 30 days or more and still test positive. A meth or heroin addict can be high right now – pop a pill and have a clean drug test in a matter of a few hours. The alcoholic can abstain for just an hour and test clean. Think about that – in just a few short hours, about the time it takes to be admitted to the ER, examined, and treated. Comforting, isn’t it? The crackhead you work with could test clean with a quick pop of a pill while last week’s UTI could cause you to test dirty. So very comforting.
The reported instances of false positives are about 1 in 10,000. How many samples are sent to any given lab on any given day? New hires, potential hires, temp agencies, injured workers, concerned parents, random employee tests… Don’t, for even a second, think that there are a bunch of people working at these labs that give a hoot about any given test result. They get a batch of samples, pour, dip, read, record, and move on. They don’t go back and test for any other contributing factor – on negatives or positives. 1 in 10,000 = false positive… a number labs are willing to admit. Makes me wonder where the real number falls?
Let’s work with that figure, though. On any given morning, the lab may see 20,000 samples from around the country. This lab will ruin the lives of two completely random people this morning, two more this afternoon, and again tomorrow and the next day and so on. These people, apparently, are collateral damage in the war on drugs. I guess that’s an acceptable margin of error, unless it’s my test…
Worse is the hell you’d pay to prove the error. According to a three of the labs I spoke with, when researching this subject, the test results actually belong to the employer (former employer?). You can not have any access to or control over the bodily fluid you were forced to submit, once you excrete it. One could petition the employer to request further testing up to one year from the date of the test. However, if the test was clean, the sample is completely destroyed – there’d be no way of proving any form of tampering via quick cleansing remedies.
It’s become something we accept in our daily lives. We feel secure thinking our coworkers have been carefully screened and are clean. If one of them tested dirty, we’d be shocked beyond believing any cockamamie BS story they cooked up to explain it away. We know the dude making our burger is probably stoned right now, and we’re fine with that. What if clumsy Bobby trips and falls into the stoned grill cook who catches himself on the grill burning his hand? Guess who’s losing their job? Not clumsy Bobby. They’re not even going to test Bobby’s urine.
We happily accept ‘legal’ drug use in our wonderful “drug free workplace”…
Tags: deep thoughts, humor, life lessons
