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Pissing on Demand : Workplace Drug Testing and the Rise of the Detox Industry
Abstract
Drug testing has become the norm in many workplaces. In order to get a job, potential employees are required to provide their urine for testing. Pissing on Demandexamines this phenomenon along with the resulting rise of the anti-drug testing movement, or the "detox industry," that works to beat these tests. Strategies include over-the-counter products like "body flushers" that sound innocent but are really designed to mask the presence of illegal drugs to kits advertised in pro-drug publications like High Timesthat make no bones about their real purpose. The first expose of the detox industry in all its manifestations, this book is required reading for anyone concerned with social control, privacy, and workers' rights.
... "Employee control methods have evolved drastically over the past few decades. Previous generations of workers were subject, for example, to having lunch boxes and purses searched or were forced to punch time cards" (Tunnell 2004). Today, searching through your peanut butter and jelly has turned into searching through the contents of your kidneys or even your scalp. ...
... Today, searching through your peanut butter and jelly has turned into searching through the contents of your kidneys or even your scalp. According to Psychemedics Corporation (currently performing hair analysis for over 1,600 organizations), not only can the company detect the presence of a drug in a hair sample, but they can also provide accurate information on the quantity and history of drug use (Tunnell 2004). Before someone considers trying the latest super-hybrid drug in Europe, think of those people at Psychemedics, as "corporate drug testing policies have almost universally held up to challenges in court" (Maher 2004, p. B1). Background checks are another tool used by employers we will scrutinize. ...
... "Pre-employment screening currently is the most commonly used type of drug testing. 78% of companies require jobapplicant drug testing" (Tunnell 2004). Lockheed Martin, one of Colorado's largest employers, is just one of the companies that comprise the 78% figure. ...
Introduction In the very near future, across the nation, hordes of students will be graduating from college. Before the last mortarboard floats to the ground, the final congratulatory toast is made, and the last grandparent gingerly boards a departing plane, the new graduates will be faced with many decisions about their future. Some decisions, like which sunscreen to use during a month-long sojourn in Spain, may not be pondered for very long. On the other hand, choosing between E.J. Gallo and Echo Star for a first job might require a pot of coffee and a family meeting. Unfortunately, many young adults entering the work force do not have a firm understanding of the complex nature of the professional world. For these young people, the decision to take a job is routinely based on limited factors such as salary and medical insurance. Salary and benefits are imperative, but there are other regularly neglected questions that should always be posed to potential employers. For example, why is there an e-mail privacy disclaimer in my employment contract? Will my telephone conversations at work be monitored? Why is there a closed-circuit camera by the water cooler in the lunchroom? With respect to such questions about workplace privacy, a lack of experience can make young employees blind to the issues. The purpose of this chapter is to help inform people about workplace privacy. Being more informed about workplace privacy issues will allow graduates to make sharpened social decisions and, hopefully, avoid any uncomfortable workplace privacy related situations in the future. The key issues to be addressed are: employee investigations, electronic employee surveillance, and legal privacy 133 protections. Each of the aforementioned sub-topics will be analyzed in-depth. Furthermore, at the end of the chapter, these issues will be dissected using widely supported ethical principles where applicable. After reading this chapter, some light will be shed on the controversial topics of the social, technical, and ethical ramifications of workplace privacy. Privacy is a term often misinterpreted. The Supreme Court has broadly defined privacy as "the right of the individual to control the dissemination of information about oneself" (Rich 1995, par. 4). The definition of privacy as it applies to the workplace is based on the Supreme Court's definition. However, three contingency tests must be applied on an individual basis to initially determine if an employee has an "expectation of privacy." The three contingency tests are: 1. A subjective test: This test evaluates the means by which an employee has attempted to protect his/her privacy. 2. An objective test: This test evaluates the expectation of privacy an employee has in his office or desk in light of security measures and surveillance of employees in the workplace. 3. A reasonableness standard: This test judges whether the inception and the scope of invasion of privacy is reasonable under the circumstances… (Rich 1995, par. 6).
... However, drug testing is becoming a frequent part of work life as well. About 40 per cent of Fortune 500 companies conduct drug testing of their employees or prospective employees (Tunnell, 2004). Surveillance of the body is thus moving from the marginal into the mainstream. ...
... First of all, these technologies tend to be used when identification of larger groups or in large organizations is at stake such as the Olympics, refugee flows and airports, mentioned above. Ken Tunnell's (2004) study of workplace drug testing shows that this type of testing is far likelier within large, heterogeneous organizations. These technologies are increasingly cheap. ...
... A simple drug test kit, for example, costs no more than US$15, although the cost is not inconsiderable if you are screening tens of thousands of people, which is the case with most western criminal justice systems when it comes to drug testing. However, there are a number of symbolic benefits for the users of these technologies, such as feelings of safety and increased confidence in their abilities (Tunnell, 2004). Drug testing is therefore like an insurance policy that one buys to protect oneself from possible future risks. ...
The article suggests that surveillance of the body is gradually becoming a major source of identification, as well as a vital element of late-modern mechanisms of social exclusion. The increasing demand for technological verification of identity is a result of intricate connections between our notions of the self, order, efficiency and security. Behind the growing acceptance of these new technologies, such as biometric passports, biometric ID cards, drug testing, and DNA databases, are fears connected to those who may have a ‘stolen identity’, are unidentified, or ‘identity-less’, such as potentially fraudulent welfare recipients, ‘identity thieves’, terrorists, immigrants and asylum seekers. However, unlike Foucault's disciplinary power, the latest technologies no longer see the body as something that needs to be trained and disciplined, but rather as a source of unprecedented accuracy and precision. Bodies become ‘coded’ and function as ‘passwords’. This form of identification is particularly relevant since its mode of operation enables identification and denial of access at-a-distance, thus fitting perfectly into the contemporary modes of disembedded global governance.
... Although drug testing protocols may vary depending on the agency and the funding available per sample, approximately 80 % of employers still use urine as their primary sampling medium. [1] An advantage of urinalysis for drug screening is the most common because it has a large detection window for drugs of abuse, it is relatively inexpensive to perform especially for larger companies, and there is minimum sample preparation, which makes it easier to screen for drugs than other biological matrices, i.e. blood or hair. Amphetamines and cocaine metabolites can be detected in a urine sample for 2 up to 4 days; while chronic use of marijuana and benzodiazepines may be detectable for up to a month. ...
... While the response accuracy for immunoassays has increased through the years, they still only remain 95 % accurate. [1,7] However, this accuracy decreases significantly when the urine samples have been adulterated. [12,13,14] Previous studies related to adulterated drug samples have been carried out on other immunoassay techniques including RIA [4], cloned enzyme donor immunoassay [15,16], enzyme immunoassay [17], FPIA [6] and EMIT [18,19]. ...
The use of immunoassays for drug screening has increased due to their sensitivity towards target analytes, specifically the enzyme linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) technique. Adulterant test strips are commonly used in conjunction with immunoassay tests to ensure that the integrity of the specimen has not been altered prior to drug screening. This research focuses on determining which adulterants can produce a false negative result, not only with one of the screening tests, but throughout the entire screening process. Seven adulterants were tested for their ability to generate false negative results for the ELISA by decreasing the detectable antigen concentration to below industry used cut off levels. Each adulterant was added to a urine sample containing one of five different drugs at 5 different concentrations (0, 5, 10, 25, and 50%). Five different urine samples that contain drugs and drug metabolites of benzoylecgonine, THC‐COOH, α‐PVP, D‐amphetamine, and Diazepam, were treated with each of the seven adulterants and analyzed on the ELISA and subsequently by two different test strips. The results indicated that four adulterants (i.e. bleach, Drano®, vinegar, and sodium nitrite) generated the most false negatives for both test strips and the ELISA at surprisingly low concentrations, ~5% v/v. Thus indicating that there are still ways that a urine sample that contains drugs could be analyzed and labeled “clean and free of drugs” after going through a common screening process. These results suggest that new drug screening techniques need to be developed to detect adulterants in urine samples for drug screening.
... Employee and applicant drug testing was clearly in the spirit of this 8 Facts in this paragraph are taken from Tunnell (2004), Ch. 1; National Research Council (1994) Ch. 6 and Appendix A. Prior to the 1980s, only the military had instituted a drug testing policy for its employees. Even this was not comprehensive; rather the military required only that soldiers pass a drug test before they would be sent home from Vietnam (Tunnell, 2004). The Navy began widespread drug testing in 1982 with other branches following shortly thereafter. ...
... 15 Roughly 70% of employers order a confirmatory test in the event of a positive initial screen (Conference Board, 1990). 16 The Supreme Court has ruled that the gas chromatography and mass spectrometry (GC/MS) procedures used in these second tests are highly accurate and admissible as evidence (Tunnell, 2004). of false negatives that occur even in the absence of evasion efforts by tested individuals. 17 False negative rates average 20% over the five main drug classes but are highest for marijuana—over 40% (U.S. ...
Half of today's US workforce is employed by firms that conduct some form of drug testing–a dramatic increase from near-zero levels of testing in the early 1980s. This paper examines the labor market impacts of this large policy change. I incorporate drug testing into a standard Roy model and derive predictions concerning sorting of drug users and demographic groups across the testing and non-testing sectors. Consistent with the model, I find increased employment of non-users in the testing sector following the advent of drug testing. The increase was larger for blacks, a group with higher perceived use rates. Using state-level variation in the timing and nature of drug testing regulation, I also find labor market impacts for blacks that are consistent with discrimination against them in the absence of reliable drug testing. The adoption of pro-testing legislation increases the share of blacks working in the testing sector by 8 to 25%, with the largest shifts among low skilled black men. It also increases blacks' benefits coverage (which is associated with firm testing) and raises low skilled black men's wages by at least 4%. Results from anti-testing states suggest that employers substitute white women for blacks in the absence of testing.
... This insecurity is often achieved through the maintenance of a state of 'permanent emergency', which may be used to achieve control and set boundaries within a society [79,26]. This concept has been debated for many years [52], with Neocleous [79] providing historical examples, to demonstrate how 'temporary' emergency powers have been used to limit workers' rights and regulate behaviour [78], and how such powers have subsequently become permanent, including those that erode civil liberties [105]. ...
Commercial organisations continue to face a growing and evolving threat of data breaches and system compromises, making their cyber-security function critically important. Many organisations employ a Chief Information Security Officer (CISO) to lead such a function. We conducted in-depth, semi-structured interviews with 15 CISOs and six senior organisational leaders, between October 2019 and July 2020, as part of a wider exploration into the purpose of CISOs and cyber-security functions. In this paper, we employ broader security scholarship related to ontological security and sociological notions of identity work to provide an interpretative analysis of the CISO role in organisations. Research findings reveal that cyber security is an expert system that positions the CISO as an interpreter of something that is mystical, unknown and fearful to the uninitiated. They show how the fearful nature of cyber security contributes to it being considered an ontological threat by the organisation, while responding to that threat contributes to the organisation's overall identity. We further show how cyber security is analogous to a belief system and how one of the roles of the CISO is akin to that of a modern-day soothsayer for senior management; that this role is precarious and, at the same time, superior, leading to alienation within the organisation. Our study also highlights that the CISO identity of protector-from-threat, linked to the precarious position, motivates self-serving actions that we term `cyber sophistry'. We conclude by outlining a series of implications for both organisations and CISOs.
... Notions of risk-taking and edgework have been the subject of examination and debate (see Lyng 2004), although some have dismissed cultural criminological study of graffiti writing (e.g., Ferrell 1996;Kindynis 2017) as little more than romanticizing subcultures (see, e.g., Matthews 2014). Cultural criminological principles have, however, been used in consideration of banal and "everyday" issues from petty youth offending and diversion efforts (Ilan 2010(Ilan , 2013 to urine tests (Tunnell 2004). Cultural criminology has thus explored the interplay between boredom and excitement that energizes and animates so many acts of crime and control (Steinmetz et al. 2017). ...
Cultural criminology understands crime and its control as products of meaning. It explores simultaneously the macro-, meso- and micro-levels of social life, sensitive to the operation of power, in order to produce critical analyses that are politically potent and germane to contemporary circumstances. The cultural criminological project is broad and inclusive, but focused and urgent. It relishes coalition and collaboration, clarity of thought and purpose, praxis and intervention. In its relatively short history, it has carved out a distinctive identity, while contributing something to the development of a host of other perspectives. This article begins by offering a contemporary definition of cultural criminology, including some reflection on its antecedents and the responses that have been addressed recently to its critics. This is followed by a discussion of the concerns cultural criminology shares with a variety of complementary perspectives and how it can be used to address malign structures and discourses. Finally, the relationship that cultural criminology might form with transformative politics is explored briefly. As truth and meaning have become the theaters of struggle between fundamentally opposed political positions promising radically different visions of crime, criminalization, criminal justice and everyday life, never has cultural criminology been more prescient and necessary. The time for cultural criminology is now.
... PWUD may have difficulty entering the formal economy for a range of reasons. These include, but are not limited to: prior criminal convictions (Pager 2003); drug testing, which is commonly a mandatory condition for job eligibility (Tunnell 2004); or the structural features of drug use scenes. For example, socioeconomic disadvantage and housing insecurity have been independently linked to job instability, and these social, structural and environmental influences may magnify challenges related to labour market participation (Long et al. 2014, Sztramko et al. 2014, Richardson et al. 2013, Braine 2013, Sherman et al. 2006. ...
Introduction:
Socioeconomically marginalized people who use illicit drugs (PWUD) often engage in alternative income generating activities to meet their basic needs. These activities commonly carry a number of health and social risks, which may prompt some PWUD to consider addiction treatment to reduce their drug use or drug-related expenses. We sought to determine whether engaging in certain forms of income generation was independently associated with self-reported need for addiction treatment among a cohort of PWUD in Vancouver, Canada.
Methods:
Data from two prospective cohorts of PWUD in Vancouver were used in generalized estimating equations to identify factors associated with self-reported need for addiction treatment, with a focus on income generating activities.
Results:
Between June 2013 and May 2014, 1285 respondents participated in the study of whom 483 (34.1%) were female and 396 (30.8%) indicated that they needed addiction treatment. In final multivariate analyses, key factors significantly and positively associated with self-reported need for addiction treatment included engaging in illegal income generating activities (adjusted odds ratio [AOR]=1.96, 95% confidence interval [CI}: 1.11-3.46); sex work (AOR=1.61, 95% CI: 1.05-2.47), homelessness (AOR=1.65, 95% CI: 1.22-2.25); and recent engagement in counselling (AOR=1.85, 95% CI: 1.40-2.44).
Discussion:
Our results suggest that key markers of socioeconomic marginalization are strongly linked with a stated need for addiction treatment. These findings underscore the need to provide appropriate and accessible addiction treatment access to marginalized PWUD and to consider alternative approaches to reduce socioeconomic disadvantage.
... Drittens werden Drogentests von verschiedenen Autor*innen als Disziplinierungstechnik verstanden und in den theoretischen Kontext der Diszipli- narmacht (Foucault) gestellt (u.a. Gilliom 1994;Tunnell 2004). Im Folgenden sollen diese drei theoretischen Anknüpfungspunkte für eine so- zialwissenschaftlich-kriminologische Analyse von Drogentests vorstellt und die dabei offen gebliebenen Fragen herausgearbeitet werden. ...
Es war der 2 Juli 2000, als der Deutsche Fußball-Bund (DFB) den Beschluss fasste, den Trainer des Erstliga-Clubs Bayer Leverkusen, Christoph Daum, ab dem 1. Juni 2001 als Bundestrainer zu beschäftigen. Gut drei Monate später allerdings stand fest: Daum wird weder Bundestrainer noch ist er länger Trainer von Bayer Leverkusen Was war geschehen? Nachdem der Manager des FC Bayern München, Uli Hoeneß, in der Münchner Abendzeitung (vom 1.10.2000) Christoph Daum (mit den Worten: „Der DFB kann doch keine Aktion wie ‚Keine Macht den Drogen‘ starten und Herr Daum hat vielleicht damit etwas zu tun.“) des Drogenkonsums bezichtigt hatte, forderte Bayern Münchens Vize-Präsident, Fritz Scherer, von dem designierten Bundestrainer einen Drogentest (in diesem Fall: eine Haaranalyse) ein, um etwaige Drogenkonsum-Vorwürfe auszuräumen.
... Cultural criminology is a rich, dynamic, fluid-and occasionally elusive-orientation and perspective that has developed over the last fifteen years and that seeks to comprehend how crime and crime control are constructed, enforced, and resisted (e.g., Ferrell, 2001a: 75;Hayward and Morrison, 2009;Presdee, 2000;Tunnell, 2004). Drawing inspiration from the work on subcultural symbolism and mediated social control by the Birmingham Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies in the 1970s, cultural criminology provides a bridge between subcultural theories of deviance and explorations of postmodern ironies and contradictions (South, 1997: 92-3), while investigating how various cultural forms and cultural expressions (such as art and music) become criminalized and the ways in which perceptions and understandings of crime and crime control are constructed (Ferrell, 1995: 29;Ferrell, 1998aFerrell, , 2001aFerrell et al., 2008: 59-60;Greer, 2004;Hayward and Morrison, 2009: 97-8;Presdee, 2000: 15, 17). ...
Within the last two decades, green criminology has emerged as a distinctive area of study, drawing together criminologists with a wide range of specific research interests and representing varying theoretical orientations. Green criminology spans the micro to the macro, from work on individual-level environmental crimes to business/corporate violations to state transgressions, and includes research conducted from both mainstream and critical theoretical perspectives, as well as arising out of interdisciplinary projects. With few exceptions, there has been little work attempting to explicitly or implicitly integrate cultural criminology with green criminology and vice versa. This article promulgates a green-cultural criminologyan approach that seeks to incorporate a concern with the cultural significance of the environment, environmental crime, and environmental harm into the green criminological enterprise. It begins by demonstrating how cultural criminology is, at some levels, already doing green criminology. It then attempts to map a green criminology onto several key dimensions of cultural criminology: (a) the contestation of space, transgression, and resistance; (b) the way(s) in which crime is constructed and represented by the media; and (c) patterns of constructed consumerism. This article concludes by showing how a green-criminology-cultural-criminology cross-fertilization would be mutually beneficial.
... In order to learn more about how racial differences affect department store job opportunities, it is necessary to complement statistical and case study evidence with research methodologies that are capable of uncovering the factors that contribute to gaps in occupational opportunity among race groups in the US workplace. In particular, we need research that is capable of examining the scope of personality tests, drug testing, and other tools Downloaded by [192.95.62.214] at 20:27 30 January 2016 used to classify and sort workers in the postindustrial workplace (Kirschenman and Neckerman 1991;Steven P. Vallas 1999;Moss and Tilly 2001;Kenneth D. Tunnell 2004). It would also be worthwhile to pursue experimental methods, like those used in Bertrand and Mullainathan's audit study (2003), that are capable of monitoring employers' responses to workers who are similarly educated. ...
Much of the literature regarding the employability of African-American women focuses on how demographic factors like single parenthood, limited social capital, and low levels of education diminish their employment options. This study engages this literature by exploring the role that institutional factors, including state action and cost-cutting strategies in the workplace, play in shaping the structure of job opportunities available to high school-educated African-American women. Focusing on department store workers in the San Francisco Bay area, this case study highlights how shifts, including the increasing contingency of employment between 1970 and 2000, have constrained African-American women's experience and progress in this low-skilled workplace.
... americana, hanno problematizzato i risultati del WDT [28] e hanno scoperto persino l'esistenza di una vera e propria " Detox industry " [31]. In Italia i dati a disposizione sono ancora molto limitati, poiché l'applicazione dell'Accordo Stato – Regioni è, come abbiamo visto, molto recente. ...
The Permanent Conference for Relations between State, Regions and Autonomous Provinces of Trento and Bolzano, sanctioned by a decision of 18 September 2008 an agreement on procedures for health assessments of presence/absence of drug (Workplace Drug Testing - WDT) provided for in paragraph 2 of art. 8 of the agreement signed October 30, 2007 from the same conference. The measure provides that after test for First Level, carried out by occupational physicians in companies that have staff with duties to third parties at risk, follow the Second Level controls to be carried out by Addiction Services of the Hospitals premises. The Service Dependencies for the ASL RM D has enabled a dedicated centre that deals with carrying out these checks according to regulation. In the first 18 months of activity have been reported by the companies 90 employees, 76 were invited and 58 of these have completed the diagnostic process. The 95,8% of the summoned workers are constituted by males and the middle age is 36,2 years (range 22-58); the 53,4% had been signalled in the First level for positiveness to the THC and 39,7% to the cocaine. This article suggests that in addition to epidemiological data, it should complement clinical studies on workers with jobs at risk of third parties unknown to Public Drug Addiction Rehabilitation Center.
... While drug testing has been construed as intrusive and draconian (see, e.g., Tunnell, 2004), it is an intermediate sanctioning approach to breaking the drugs-crime relationship that factors both public safety through system supervision and rehabilitative objectives. The impact of drug testing as observed here also may lend support to the value of program evaluation generally and the potential for identifying surprising collateral policy benefits. ...
Through funding from the national Residential Substance Abuse Treatment Program, the South Carolina Department of Corrections implemented the Correctional Recovery Academy in the Turbeville Medium Security Institution to treat drug‐dependent offenders. The program features a cognitive–behavioral change modality delivered in a modified therapeutic community to first time, non‐violent, drug‐dependent, youthful male offenders. A quasi‐experimental design was employed to specify impact as indicated by recidivism, relapse, and parole revocation. While analyses revealed no statistically significant difference between treatment and control group participants on these outcome measures, implications regarding the efficacy of the treatment modality are ambiguous as implementation failure masked determination of program effects. Drug testing frequency after release, however, was found to be a significant factor precluding failure, contrary to the conventional view that increased testing identifies greater use.
... Although authors have suggested that drug users can beat the tests, no concrete evidence was found of employee success in avoiding positive tests, as many adulterants can be detected. There are numerous websites advertising a variety of approaches to evade testing [16], and the size of the semi-underground 'detox industry' has grown in proportion to the decline in drug-positive employees [66]. The numerous 'folk' technologies used to mask drug-positives have not been researched adequately. ...
Urinalysis testing in the work-place has been adopted widely by employers in the United States to deter employee drug use and promote 'drug-free' work-places. In other countries, such as Canada, testing is focused more narrowly on identifying employees whose drug use puts the safety of others at risk.
We review 20 years of published literature on questions relevant to the objectives of work-place drug testing (WPDT), with a special emphasis on cannabis, the most commonly detected drug.
We conclude (i) that the acute effects of smoking cannabis impair performance for a period of about 4 hours; (ii) long-term heavy use of cannabis can impair cognitive ability, but it is not clear that heavy cannabis users represent a meaningful job safety risk unless using before work or on the job; (iii) urine tests have poor validity and low sensitivity to detect employees who represent a safety risk; (iv) drug testing is related to reductions in the prevalence of cannabis positive tests among employees, but this might not translate into fewer cannabis users; and (v) urinalysis has not been shown to have a meaningful impact on job injury/accident rates.
Urinalysis testing is not recommended as a diagnostic tool to identify employees who represent a job safety risk from cannabis use. Blood testing for active tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) can be considered by employers who wish to identify employees whose performance may be impaired by their cannabis use.
Das Buch nimmt eine qualitative Bestandsaufnahme von Drogentestanwendungen in Deutschland vor und fragt dabei nach ihren Kontexten, ihrer Durchführung und ihren Folgen. Von besonderem Interesse ist dabei die Frage nach den spezifischen Intentionen (Anwendungsrationalitäten) der jeweiligen Drogenkonsumkontrollen, die für unterschiedliche soziale Felder – Soziale Arbeit, Schule und Arbeitsplatz – vertiefend untersucht werden. Zugleich werden kontextspezifische und -übergreifende Folgen für die getesteten Individuen und die Wirkungen der Testpraxen auf die Anwendungskontexte selbst beschrieben und analysiert.
Der Inhalt
• Hintergrund und Anlage der Untersuchung
• Detektionsanalytische Grundlagen von Drogentests
• Eine qualitative Bestandsaufnahme von Drogentestanwendungen in Deutschland
• Drogentests in der Sozialen Arbeit
• Drogentests an Schulen
• Drogentests am Arbeitsplatz
• Diskussion: Anwendungsrationalitäten und Folgen des Drogentestens
Die Zielgruppen
Wissenschaftler und Wissenschaftlerinnen sowie Praktiker und Praktikerinnen aus den Bereichen Sozial- und Gesundheitswissenschaften, Pädagogik, Soziale Arbeit, Arbeitsmedizin, Arbeitssicherheit, Kriminologie
Die Autoren
Simon Egbert ist wissenschaftlicher Mitarbeiter am Institut für Kriminologische Sozialforschung der Universität Hamburg.
Dr. Henning Schmidt-Semisch ist Professor am Fachbereich Human- und Gesundheitswissenschaften der Universität Bremen.
Dr. Katja Thane und Dr. Monika Urban sind wissenschaftliche Mitarbeiterinnen am Fachbereich Human- und Gesundheitswissenschaften der Universität Bremen.
Although drug tests have been in use in Germany since the early/middle 1990s, there are still no systematic inquiries about the scope and distribution of the corresponding contexts of application. In this research report, we present the first results of the research project 'Rationalities of Drug Testing and their Social Consequences', financed by the DFG. This specific contribution aims primarily at a qualitative survey of those social contexts in Germany.
Noch immer wird der Konsum von Drogen oftmals mit Krankheit in Verbindung gebracht, zu omnipräsent sind die damit verbundenen Konzepte von Sucht und Abhängigkeit. Zur Detektion und damit Zuschreibung und Klassifizierung derartig ‚krankhaften‘ Verhaltens werden zunehmend Drogentests, das heißt technische Verfahren eingesetzt, die vermehrt als Schnelltests entwickelt und vermarktet werden und dabei verstärkt auf visuelle Auswertungsverfahren zurückgreifen. Der folgende Beitrag basiert auf der Annahme, dass Bildlichkeit und visuelle Darstellung spezifische Effekte auf das von Sichtbarmachungsinstrumenten produzierte Wissen haben und die menschliche Praxis mit letztgenannten in erheblichem Maße beeinflussen. Daher möchten wir am Beispiel des Anwendungskontextes Arbeitsplatz den Stellenwert von Drogentest als Identifizierungs- und Selektionstechnologie hervorheben und die Rolle von Visualität als Gegenstand einer ‚Soziologie des Teste(n)s‘ konturieren.
Obgleich Drogentests in Deutschland bereits seit Anfang/Mitte der 1990er Jahre zur Anwendung kommen, existieren bislang keine systematischen Erhebungen über die Breite und Verteilung der Anwendungskontexte. Im Folgenden werden erste Ergebnisse des DFG-Projektes ‚Anwendungsrationalitäten und Folgen von Drogentests‘ vorgestellt. Dabei zielt der Beitrag in erster Linie auf eine qualitative Bestandsaufnahme jener sozialen Kontexte, in denen in Deutschland Drogentests durchgeführt werden.
Although drug tests have been in use in Germany since the early/middle 1990s, there are still no systematic inquiries about the scope and distribution of the corresponding contexts of application. In this research report, we present the first results of the research project ‘Rationalities of Drug Testing and their Social Consequences’, financed by the DFG. This specific contribution aims primarily at a qualitative survey of those social contexts in Germany.
Aims: At the time of the study, the synthetic cannabinoid K2/K3, which is sold as ‘Spice’ incense, was legal in many states in the US. Because the US Drug Enforcement Agency has emergency scheduled ‘Spice’, the producers of these synthetic substances have altered their chemical compounds to remain legal and on the market. This study seeks to understand the reasons for use of these substances and the role US drug policy plays in encouraging use.
Methods: Employed a mixed-methods approach. We surveyed 374 undergraduate students in a Southern California University and conducted 25 qualitative interviews of users who answered a newspaper or flyer advertisement of the study.
Findings: Most of the users in the qualitative sample sought a legal alternative to cannabis (their drug of choice) to avoid positive drug test screenings and criminal sanctions. Many were attending abstinence-only drug treatment programmes, under community corrections, or were seeking a career in the US military. These individuals were randomly drug tested and knew that the metabolites of synthetic cannabis are not detected in standard urine drug screenings.
Conclusions: US drug policies – the prohibition of marijuana and the proliferation of drug testing – have led users to seek out legal highs.
Higher income is generally associated with better health outcomes; however, among people who inject drugs (IDU) income generation frequently involves activities, such as sex work and drug dealing, which pose significant health risks. Therefore, we sought to examine the relationship between level of income and specific drug use patterns and related health risks.
This study involved IDU participating in a prospective cohort study in Vancouver, Canada. Monthly income was categorized based on non-fixed quartiles at each follow-up with the lowest level serving as the reference category in generalized linear mixed-effects regression.
Among our sample of 1032 IDU, the median average monthly income over the study follow-up was 400) (OR=97.8).
Among IDU in Vancouver, average monthly income levels were low and higher total monthly income was linked to high-risk income generation strategies as well as a range of drug use patterns characteristic of higher intensity addiction and HIV risk. These findings underscore the need for interventions that provide economic empowerment and address high intensity addiction, especially for female IDU.
Edgework can be a useful heuristic tool in producing counter-statements about Orthodox Criminology, where the measurable has arguably become more important than the meaningful. This paper focuses on the embodied experiential nexus of culture and crime in which criminology is taught, administered, and investigated. The Burkean framework of Dramatism is used to reveal how collective creative productions by students can provide insight into the political context of the contemporary criminology classroom. Through an analysis of instant ethnographies penned by participants of a flash mob I illustrate how the role of autonomy and responsibility are not resources that students readily draw upon to understand themselves in relation to the production of knowledge and social change. These observations support some of the concerns raised by Cultural Criminologist about the rise of administrative criminology. In the spirit of detournement, I argue that one way to facilitate student engagement with knowledge production differently is to invite them to experience moments of embodied transgressions.
During the late 1990s in the United States, rural Kentucky (and rural pockets of nearby states) witnessed the emergence of a new pharmaceutical drug of abuse. The powerful oxycodone OxyContin, first manufactured in 1996 and designed for time-release pain relief, found a ready population in rural hamlets and mountain communities. Intended for patients in pain associated with terminal disease, it became a drug of abuse as it was overprescribed and trafficked within newly developed black markets. This paper describes the takeoff of this new drug of abuse, its antecedents, its effects on rural communities, and coordinated efforts at containing it. Following the trends in use and abuse, this paper presents evidence of an epidemic created in part by organizations in both the private and the public sectors. The paper also describes the much publicized and alleged relationship between Oxycontin use and increasing crime rates in Kentucky (and the surrounding Appalachian region). This paper shows that this drug-crime connection, propagated by media and government sources, has been socially constructed and bears little resemblance to empirical reality.
Kriminologische Drogenforschung ist und bleibt spannend, denn jede Generation bringt ihre Drogen oder Konsumformen hervor,
die die älteren Generationen in Panik versetzen. „Komasaufen“ („Rauschtrinken“), „Gehirndoping“ oder „Hördrogen“ – stetig
gibt es neue Konsumthematisierungen, die Stoff für die Drogenforschung und damit auch für Kriminologen bieten, die die (vor
allem staatlichen) Reaktionen auf den Konsum beäugen. Warum nun sollte der Blick auf die Ursachen für den Konsum langweilig
sein? Im Folgenden soll diese Frage erörtert werden, indem aufgezeigt wird, dass die Ursachenforschung über eine gewisse Ignoranz
gegenüber Kontextualisierungen des Konsums und den Setzungen der Legislative verfügt, die dazu führt, dass sie sich selbst
demontiert. Zugleich heißt das aber nicht, dass sie per se uninteressant ist. Jedoch erörtert sie zu gerne und zu oft die
ewig gleichen Fragen auf die bekannte Weise und repliziert damit lediglich Erkenntnisse. Dass das nicht sein muss, zeigen
andere Spielarten ätiologischer Forschung, wie z. B. jene, die interaktionistisch geprägt sind. Neben dem Blick auf die Schwierigkeiten,
die die beiden Richtungen, also normative und interaktionistische Ätiologie, teilen, soll aufgezeigt werden, warum die letztere
sowohl gegenstandsbezogener wie spannender daherkommt.
Sportliche Wettkämpfe und Gesundheit stehen seit jeher im Widerspruch zueinander. Die Legende des Boten Feidipides, der 490
v.Ch. nach der Schlacht von Marathon bis nach Athen lief, um dort – kurz bevor der tot zusammenbrach – vom Siege zu berichten,
zeugt davon. Dieser (historisch nicht verbürgte) ‚Marathonlauf‘ inspiriert den Wettkampfsport bis heute und signalisiert zugleich,
dass für den sportlichen Sieg der Ruin der Gesundheit in Kauf genommen werden muss.
During the past ten years, rural Kentucky (and rural pockets of nearby states) witnessed the emergence of a new pharmaceutical drug of abuse. The powerful oxycodone, OxyContin, first manufactured in 1996 and designed for timerelease pain relief, found aready population in rural hamlets and mountain communities. Intended for patients in pain associated with terminal disease, it became a drug of abuse as it was over-prescribed andtrafficked. This Justice and Safety Research Bulletin describes the sudden growth in the use of this new drug and its antecedents. Describing the trends in use and abuse,this Bulletin presents evidence of an epidemic created in part by organizations in both the private and public sectors. It describes the marked changes in OxyContin arrests but concludes that arrest trendslikely reveal more about law enforcement than drug use. It also describes the muchpublicized relationship between OxyContin use andcrime in Kentucky, withemphasis on the eastern partof the state and suggests thatthe much heralded crime increases were more rhetorical than empirical.
The U.S. courts consistently have upheld the constitutionality of laws regarding mandatory drug testing policies in the workplace and schools; these policies were designed to detect individuals' drug use that could compromise public safety. Yet looking at the uses of drug test results in another setting—the justice system—reveals one aspect that goes largely unaddressed in these laws and prior research on drug testing: the organizational context surrounding the administration of drug tests that shapes how their results are understood. In response, this article uses ethnographic methods to analyze the ways that staff at a juvenile drug court in southern California interprets drug test results. The article demonstrates that the staff's understandings of drug testing results involve interactional and institutional processes, dependent upon meanings constructed and situated in local organizational contexts.
Congress passed the Drug-Free Workplace Act in April 1988, which resulted in the Mandatory Guidelines for Federal Workplace Drug Testing Programs. The intent was to establish a substance-free work environment for all federal workers by requiring that all federal employees pass a urine drug test before employment. These guidelines specifically, and exclusively, focus on testing urine specimens for metabolites of marijuana, cocaine, phencyclidine, opiates (focusing on heroin metabolites), and amphetamines (including Ecstasy). Since then, there have been many scientific, technical, and legal challenges to the validity of urine drug testing. In response, the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, a division operating under the executive branch of the United States Department of Health and Human Services, put forth, through many revisions, strict procedural guidelines and specimen validity-testing criteria to manage suspicious or adulterated samples during and after urine collection. This review focuses on the legal ramifications, the procedural process, and the sensitivity and specificity of the two urine drug tests used for workplace drug testing: immunoassay and gas chromatography-mass spectrometry. Moreover, we dissect the problematic issue of cross-sensitivity between illicit and prescription drugs, and how this affects the validity of future urine drug testing.
Although testing for illicit drugs is more prevalent than alcohol testing, results from two nationwide surveys reveal that alcohol testing of employees is on the rise.
Recent increases in the number of crime‐related commodities (e.g., burglar alarms, security systems, private security forces, and crime‐related television news programs) are critically examined in relation to mildly fluctuating national crime rates. Increasing sales of crime‐related and target‐hardening products during the time when crime oscillated only slightly are explained as capitalism's ability to create commodities from both social problems and unfounded needs. Using secondary data, I describe these crime trends and the consumption of crime‐prevention goods. Although the media apparently contributed to increasing concerns about victimization while crime was fairly stable, the process of commodity exchange for crime goods is far from simply a media‐induced phenomenon. This article relies on a critical and dialectical approach as a way of analyzing these contradictory developments.
Explores 4 major facets of the current drug-testing controversy that derive from the conflict between the individual's right to privacy and society's right to know. The 4 facets include medicine, sports, law enforcement, and the workplace. Technical problems are discussed, and legal issues that have been raised concerning the validity of testing procedures used and the reliability of evidence obtained, especially with pre-employment drug screening, are considered. Suggestions for maximizing the effectiveness of drug testing programs while minimizing legal challenges are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
This paper is concerned with the social scientific aspects of urinalysis procedures in the detection of heroin use. Data on attitudes toward urinalysis and subject behavior in regard to the test were derived from interviews with 53 former addicts who were subject to urinalysis as part of their release requirements from a federal commitment program. The study results indicate that a great deal of anxiety is associated with urinalysis both for the former addicts and the supervisory staff. Information is also provided on the procedures used by the former addicts to subvert the test. The accuracy of urinalysis tests under field conditions is questioned.
While workplace drug testing has received considerable public and scholarly attention, little of this discussion has focused on the social context within which testing is likely to occur. This paper conceptualizes drug testing as social monitoring and examines testing within a framework suggested by Donald Black's theory of social control. The central idea is that the formality of social monitoring within a group is a function of its members' social status and the social distance among them. The paper evaluates this argument in one empirical setting. Analysis of data from U.S. departments of anesthesiology indicates that drug testing, an example of formal monitoring, most often emerges in a context marked by low normative respectability and a lack of intimate relationships. The paper concludes by suggesting how variations in monitoring procedures like drug testing may affect ensuing processes of social control.
The use of herbs in the treatment of substance abuse is a relatively new phenomenon, although the practice of herbalism goes back to the dawn of humanity. Herbs are natural botanical substances which have noticeable effects on the human organism. Throughout history man has used herbs for nutritional and healing purposes as well as for getting high. Most current treatment programs for substance abusers take into account only a small portion of the healing spectrum (e.g., psychological counseling, methadone, self-help, therapeutic community). There is a growing awareness of and concern to develop programs for substance abusers which utilize a holistic approach to deal with the mental, physical, emotional, and spiritual problems accompanying substance abuse. The purpose of this article is to review the use of herbal therapy in the treatment of drug abusers. An annotated bibliography is provided.
This paper presents an interdisciplinary overview and evaluation of the narcotic testing procedures. The sources, besides the available literature, consist chiefly of 60 lengthy interviews with addicts or ex addicts who have participated in drug test programs. There are two methods of narcotics testing currently used: the Nalline test and urinalysis.