>>> Part 9 of 15...
     drug use and...accidents were possible.''  And there were
     ``...no relevant performance studies of any of the hard
     drugs...[but this is] *not critical because use is already a
     criminal act. ... the very fact that an individual uses such
     a drug indicates a lack of respect for the law that in
     itself is prejudicial to safety.''  So ended the major
     scientific study which led to regulation by the DOT.*
     ...
     ... A well-known physician from Charter Corporation was
     quoted on 5/26/89 in American Medical News that he favored
     urine testing because it led to earlier diagnosis and
     increased likelihood of recovery from addiction. ... even
     were it to be true, he failed to mention whether his country
     should switch immediately to *mandated* PAP smears and
     mammogram.
     ...
     ... our concern is neither health maintenance nor safety,
     but rather morality and control.  If we were not primarily
     concerned with fixing those ``nonconformists' '' wagons, we
     might have embraced the use of cognitive systems
     measurements instead of the whiz quiz.  There exists hand-
     eye coordination tests not unlike those of some video games,
     by which real time measurements of the functional capacities
     of key employees may be assayed and have been found to
     detect reliably various forms of human impairment [resulting
     from drugs, stress, and fatigue].  The test results were
     immediately available [real time].  Nonetheless the DOT
     safety study dismissed such tests because they cannot
     predict the presence of a precise drug or drug level; they
     did not even evaluate its potential for safety.  Gary
     Howard, the Employee Relations Director of Motorola Inc.,
     when questioned about the use of neuromuscular real time
     tests, was quoted recently as saying that they were not even
     considered and that even if a drug user were not impaired
     from off-duty use of drugs, ``We're not particularly
     concerned about impairment ... as we are about having a work
     force that doesn't use drugs.''  Re their desire to use
     best-in-class employees, ``Best-in-class people to us don't
     use drugs.  They don't abuse alcohol either...'' ... Even in
     those instances wherein a causal relationship between a drug
     and an adverse consequence has been proven [alcohol and
     accidents; cigarette smoking and lung cancer], there is good
     reason to eschew outright legal prohibition. ... Loss of
     liberties by law, momentarily accepted by society, leads
     ultimately to a reactive change.  We seem to ``pay'' for
     periods in which we even voluntarily give up our freedoms. 
     A more definitive answer is usually achieved by early
     education and experience leading to attitudinal change. 
[4] (*) CONTEMPORARY DRUG PROBLEMS, Spring 1992 pp. 1-26, ``The
business of drug testing: technological innovation and social
control''  by Prof. Lynn Zimmer and Prof. James B. Jacobs.
     ...
     This expansion of work-place drug testing could not have
     occurred without important advances in drug testing
     technology.  ...
     In an important sense, it was the availability of the new
     technologies that stimulated employers' interests in
     workers' drug use.  Prior to the 1980's, to the extent
     employers thought about a ``work-place drug problem,'' their
     concern was with alcoholics and drug addicts, not casual
     drug users.  Only after it became possible to detect casual
     users did employers begin to focus on them.  Thus drug
     testing should not be seen as a ``technological fix'' for a
     preexisting problem, but as a technological innovation that
     helped redefine the problem it initially promised to solve.
     The redefinition of the work-place drug problem to include
     casual drug users did not just ``happen.''  It was actively
     promoted by the drug testing industry, which stood to profit
     from it, and by the federal government, which had a powerful
     commitment to a zero-tolerance drug policy.  The media also
     contributed by publishing the economic costs and physical
     threats posed by drugs in the work-place.
     ...
     Improvements in drug testing's accuracy and reliability led
     more employers to implement testing programs; as demand
     expanded, so did the drug-testing industry.  Recent (1990)
     estimates are that drug testing grosses over $300 million a
     year, but this figure refers only to the equipment and
     chemicals produced by pharmaceutical companies.  Drug
     testing's increased popularity also benefits laboratories
     that conduct the tests as well as numerous other businesses
     that provide goods and services to the pharmaceutical
     companies, the laboratories, and employers.
 >>> Continued to next message...
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