Pubdate: Sun, 19 Jul 2015
Source: Blade, The (Toledo, OH)
Copyright: 2015 The Blade
Contact:  http://www.toledoblade.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/48
Author: Daniel Moore, Block News Alliance

AS ATTITUDES ABOUT MARIJUANA CHANGE, DRUG-TEST FIRMS BRACE FOR FIGHT

As attitudes toward marijuana become more lenient and states 
authorize its use for medicinal - or even recreational - purposes, a 
long-simmering debate over the efficacy of workplace drug testing has 
found a new flash point.

Marijuana accounts for more failed workplace drug tests than any 
other substance, and the new laws have the potential of decreasing or 
eliminating employer testing for it.

Defenders of drug testing maintain that employees who use drugs, 
including marijuana, have been found to miss more work, cause more 
accidents, change jobs more frequently, and ultimately cost employers 
more money.

Many of those defenders happen to be part of the drug-test industry, 
which has mobilized to oppose the wave of legislation and litigation 
that it expects to rise from the conflict between workplace policies 
and changes in laws.

But voters in four states and Washington have voted to legalize 
recreational marijuana, and nearly half of the states allow it for 
medical treatment.

Earlier this month, Ohio supporters of legal marijuana use filed 
petitions to have a legalization question placed on the Nov. 3 ballot.

The Drug & Alcohol Testing Industry Association has assembled 
pamphlets to assist businesses in defending their drug-testing programs.

It has also aggregated all U.S. state bills attempting to change 
marijuana's legal status and is soliciting donations to fund its own 
research to help businesses understand the risk of abandoning 
drug-testing programs.

Association Executive Director Laura Shelton tells business clients 
to follow federal regulations, which list marijuana as an illegal 
substance with no acceptable medical use in treatment and a high 
potential for abuse. "Our advice is that if you want to maintain a 
safe and drug-free workplace, test for those drugs" outlawed under 
federal regulations, she said.

Experts and researchers have disagreed on the effectiveness of drug 
testing since the 1980s, when it began in earnest after President 
Ronald Reagan signed an executive order requiring it for federal 
employees. A separate U.S. Transportation Department rule shortly 
thereafter added certain safety-sensitive jobs, such as truck 
drivers, railroad operators, pilots, and pipeline workers.

The standard test collected urine samples and flagged those that 
showed use of any one of five drugs: marijuana; cocaine; amphetamines 
and methamphetamines; opiates; and phencyclidine or PCP.

Private sector employers outside of those requirements soon followed 
suit. In a 1987 survey, the American Management Association found 21 
percent of major U.S. firms had testing programs. By 1996, that had 
risen to 81 percent.

In 2014, one of the largest clinical laboratories, New Jersey-based 
Quest Diagnostics, tested 9.1 million urine samples - 6.6 million for 
employers who chose to institute drug-testing programs. That compares 
with 7.6 million tests in 2013, with 5.6 million from workplaces that 
instituted drug-testing policies.

It is difficult to tie drug-testing numbers directly to employers' 
appetites for such services because the number of tests given is most 
dependent on hiring trends.

The number of failed drug tests has fallen nearly every year from a 
rate of 13.6 percent in 1988 to 3.9 percent in 2014, according to Quest.

Most of that decline happened in the early years of drug testing; in 
the past decade, the rate has stayed mostly flat.

Barry Sample, director of science and technology at Quest Diagnostics 
Employer Solutions, said the fact that federal data show that 
workplaces without testing programs have seen a bigger increase in 
current drug users confirms the deterrent effect. That "really 
reinforces for those employers why they should continue to remain 
vigilant and not relax," he said.

But privacy groups have questioned whether businesses are realizing 
the promised results.

The American Civil Liberties Union criticized much of the data the 
drug-testing industry has cited, instead backing a 1994 National 
Academy of Sciences study that found no evidence that marijuana use 
was any more of a workplace detriment than alcohol.

Michael Frone, senior research scientist at the State University of 
New York at Buffalo, said there has been no credible evidence that 
testing programs deter workers from using drugs. Rather, heavy drugs 
users may go to workplaces without testing programs and others may 
simply use less frequently to avoid detection.

Mr. Frone, who wrote the 2013 book Alcohol and Illicit Drug Use in 
the Workforce and Workplace, said little research has directly 
assessed the effect of testing programs on productivity and 
attendance. Even if employees fail a test, he added, it doesn't prove 
that they were unproductive on the job.

"A positive drug test provides no information on when an illicit 
substance was used, how often or how much is typically used, or if 
the person was or has ever been impaired at work," he said.

Drug-testing supporters and critics both agree that changing 
marijuana policies pose a threat to the practice.

"For an employer who has facilities in several different states, it 
makes it difficult to have a uniform policy when you have multiple 
states with different laws," said Clare Gallagher, a labor and 
employment partner at Eckert Seamans Cherin & Mellott, a Pittsburgh 
firm that last November created a regulated substances practice group.

Robert DuPont, president of Rockville, Md.-based Institute for 
Behavior and Health Inc., thinks the U.S. Supreme Court will 
ultimately have to reconcile the disagreement between state and federal laws.

"There's a conflict issue around privacy and productivity and concern 
about workers' health," said Mr. DuPont, who was a director of the 
National Institute on Drug Abuse in the 1970s.

Policy analysts and lawyers said that at least in the short term, 
employers can expect the courts to rule in favor of federal law. Last 
month, the Colorado Supreme Court unanimously affirmed that Dish 
Network, as a private employer, had the right to fire an employee for 
failing a drug test, despite that employee's legal right to use the 
drug in that state.

Block News Alliance consists of The Blade and the Pittsburgh 
Post-Gazette. Daniel Moore is a staff writer for the Post-Gazette.
- ---
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom