INVASION AND ERROR However routine drug tests have become, they’re still intrusive. Often, another person is there to observe the employee to ensure there is no specimen tampering. Even indirect observation can be degrading; typically, workers must remove their outer garments and urinate in a bathroom in which the water supply has been turned off. The lab procedure is a second invasion of privacy. Urinalysis reveals not only the presence of illegal drugs, but also the existence of many other physical and medical conditions, including genetic predisposition to disease – or pregnancy. In 1988, the Washington, D.C. Police Department admitted it used urine samples collected for drug tests to screen female employees for pregnancy – withouttheir knowledge or consent.
Furthermore, human error in the lab, or
the test’s failure to distinguish between legal and illegal substances,
can make even a small margin of error add up to a huge potential for
false positive results. In 1992, an estimated 22 million tests were
adminstered. If five percent yielded false positive results (a
conservative estimate of false positive rates) that means 1.1 million
people who could have been fired, or denied jobs – because of a mistake.
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