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HALTONHILLSOUTLOOK Saturday April I IKS SARAH OVERSTREET Setting limits on drug tests There s probably never been any one as opposed to mandatory drug testing as I am That Is against it In the way It gained popularity in the last few years as a tool for govern ment and private companies to ran domly demand employee urine pics Without probable cause whether you re the newest kid in the warehouse or the bookkeeper wearing a 25year pin Like George ShulU and his famous refusal to take a polygraph test I will never give at the office My company has no more reason to suspect me of drug abuse than President Reagan had to think that poor old lonesome George was a security risk Random sneaky on loyal productive employees Is an insult And the shabby reliability of drug labs is notorious In studies some labs tests have proven about as rell able an indication of drug abuse as lifting someone eyelids and demand that he or she recite the alphabet backward A recent News Inlorma Wire Service investigation pro fessionally laced urine specimens with dangerous drugs and sent them to seven different drug labs In the Washington DC area By the time the labs had finished heir sophistical ed analyses they come up wrong percent of the time And the stories of careers ruined by inaccurate drug tests are popping up with enough regularity to be truly frightening They are especially so because drug paranoia Is so high and wronged employees often have had no chance to fight back They re banded their walking papers and a Just Say No bumper sticker and shown the door Yet amid my outrage at the para noid bungling by ignorant companies and lets not forget the Navy which accused a physician of mor phlne addiction when his fondness for poppy seed bagels erroneously marked his specimen there s one Incidence of drug testing I can agree with if it Is the testing of trans portation workers on whom others de for their safely pilots navigators railroad engineers bus drivers etc No one has any business conveying others under the influence of reaction altering drugs Sen John Danor Mo makes a proper analogy when he likens drug testing these employed to checking all of us when we pass through metal detectors at airports No one has any probable cause to suspect any of us yet the consequences of one handgun sneaked through by one nut could be scores of dead Innocent people If Danforthhasagoodldca so does Rep Glenn English The Institute on Drug Abuse is now scttlngupa national certification pro gram for labs and English is sponsor ing a bill that would make employers use certified labs if they re going to fire or refuse to hire people based on their drug tests Its about time drug testing I wonder how theyll feel if English bill becomes law this spring If workers are guar anteed a fair urine test the whole is sue will quit being a mockery and at least be an option worth considering Before Congress approves drug testing for transportation workers It should specifically define the Jobs that affect others health and safety and restrict the drug testing to those