COMPULSORY DRUG ABUSE TESTING EMPLOYERS

This research develops a case opposing the practice of compulsory drug abuse testing by private employers. At the outset, it should be understood that the focus of this research is on the compulsory testing of employees for the presence in their bodily systems of illegal controlled narcotic substances. Whether the presence in bodily systems of traces such substances constitutes an abuse of drugs is beyond the scope of this research. The term drug abuse is commonly used to describe the consumption of illegal controlled narcotic substances, and the term is used in this context in this research. Compulsory testing refers to the practice of linking a right to employment with participation in a testing program.

American corporate employers have generally shown that they support drug testing in the workplace.1 As the cost of drug abuse testing becomes clearer, however, many employers are having second thought on the issue.2 Objections to drug testing in the workplace are also registered by (1) employees and civil liberties groups, who claim that the practice is an invasion of the individual's right to privacy, and (2), in many instances, by labor unions, which tend to side with their members in disputing management's right to impose

1Helen Axel, Corporate Experiences with Drug Testing Programs (New York: The Conference Board, 1988), 5.

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he mandatory testing for specific levels of specific drugs, whether such drugs are legal or legal, wherein the specific levels are those beyond which __________ 13"Random Drug Testing Program," Supervision, March 1991, 20. the functioning of the typical individual may reasonably be expected to be impaired. Even with this approach, however, the longterm right of an individual to privacy would, to some extent, be compromised. Such a compromise, however, would be similar to that associated with the loss of driving privileges for individuals suspected of driving while intoxicated and who refuse to submit to testing for the presence of alcohol in their systems at legally mandated levels. When considering the issue of compulsory drug abuse testing, the consumption of illegal narcotic substances must also be viewed from the perspective of the larger drug problem in the United States. Public and governmental attitudes toward the use of illegal narcotic substances are heavily influenced by perceptions of the country's larger drug problem. The larger drug problem in the United States, however, has three major facets. First, there is the illegal use of illegal narcotic substances. Second, there is the recreational use of legal
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Approximate Word count = 3825
Approximate Pages = 15 (250 words per page)

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