Allyson Johnson

A Piece of My Mind: One Strike and You’re Out

A young friend of mine, after serving as a poorly paid intern/underling for several years, was finally offered his dream job, with a nice title and a decent salary and even some side benefits. He told his partner and they began to dream about upgrading their housing, maybe doing a bit of traveling, paying off some debts.

And then he failed the drug test. If you contract with or receive grants from the state of California, California’s Drug-free Workplace Act of 1990 requires you to certify that you provide a drug-free workplace. The Dream Job was partially funded by the state.

Studies from the American Psychiatric Association suggest that 5% to 10% of all drug tests may result in false positives and 10% to 15% may yield false negatives. The APA recommends that before submitting to a drug test you should confirm with the lab you visit that a second, confirmatory test will be performed on any positive drug test that may occur. “When initial screening drugs tests (called immunoassays) result in positive results, a second confirmatory (Gas Chromatography Mass Spectrometry or GC-MS) test should always be done.”

My young friend, confident that he had no problem, did not do this.

And  the organization for which the tests were being given had not contracted for retakes, so none were allowed.

Why he failed – he is not and never has been a drug user, but he grabbed one of his partner’s favorite poppy-seed bagels for breakfast as he was heading out the door that morning. 

I fancy I can hear my readers groaning “Yeah, right!” in disbelief.  But multiple reputable websites (including the National Institute of Health) note the possibility of a false positive result on a drug test because of the trace opiates in poppy seeds.  I believe my young friend, not least because of his partner’s tearful regret for her ill-fated preference.

If you were planning on crossing Death Valley in the summer, and your car had a 5-10% chance of dying on the way, would you make the trip? Would you trust its maintenance to a mechanic whose work had a 10-15% chance of failing?

If you had optional surgery scheduled, and you had a 5-10% chance of being paralyzed afterward, would you go ahead? What if there was a 10-15% chance you didn’t really need the surgery?

My young friend had no choice but to take the test, despite the odds. The drug test is required, though a 5-10% chance of a false positive result plus a 10-15% chance of  a false negative result means the test is only accurate 75-85% of the time.

What can my young friend do?  Jobs in his specialty are few;  the chances of a similar opportunity arising are probably less than the chance of a false positive which cost him this one.  The Dream Job is being advertised again, and candidates are being interviewed.

“I’ll have to find some kind of job to pay the bills,” he says.  “But I may never have another chance as good, no matter how many poppyseed bagels I don’t eat.”