Pubdate: Fri, 04 Apr 2003
Source: Charleston Gazette (WV)
Copyright: 2003 Charleston Gazette
Contact:  http://www.wvgazette.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/77

RANDOM TESTS

Paramedics Not Immune

PERSONNEL who hold the lives of others in their hands - police, airline 
pilots, haulers of deadly chemicals, etc. - always should be subject to 
random drug testing, as a public safety precaution.

Paramedics should be included in this high-risk group. They have a 
life-or-death role with injured and stricken people. But it's hard to 
understand why some leaders of the Kanawha County Ambulance Authority 
oppose drug tests for crews.

Kanawha County Commissioner Kent Carper is pushing the authority to require 
random tests of the rescue workers. "This deserves a hard, serious, 
open-minded look," he told the board.

But authority member Harry Miller and director Joe Lynch seemed to shrug. 
Miller called Carper's plan "a solution before we have a problem." Lynch 
said only seven drug or alcohol incidents arose in the past 13 years. He 
said the $49 cost of tests is too high.

Well, we agree with Carper. The lives of car wreck and heart attack victims 
are too important to be jeopardized by fussing over a $49 lab fee. If the 
day ever came - heaven forbid - when a stoned paramedic caused a death or 
maiming, vulture lawyers would slap a multimillion-dollar suit on the 
negligent ambulance system that didn't screen its crews.

As Carper says, the tests could be merely random. The vast majority of the 
county's 210 emergency workers who never touch dope would have nothing to 
fear - and the chance of being tested would have a sobering effect on any 
exceptions.

Ambulance crews are in the lifesaving business - and drug tests are a 
lifesaving safeguard.
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MAP posted-by: Beth