WHY WE ARE A DRUG FREE
WORKPLACE
A
workers’ compensation insurance company will have the legal backing to deny a
workers’ compensation claim if an employee fails or refuses to take a post-
accident drug or alcohol test. A company will also have the legal backing to
have unemployment benefits denied if an employee is dismissed in violation of
the program. In order to qualify for the credit a company would be required to
conduct pre-employment drug testing on all new hires and post-accident testing
on employees who are injured due to a work related accident.
Based
upon 20 years of administrating drug test results we have come up with the
following statistics. Note- statistics will be skewed due to the inability to
calculate in refusals to test. This inability to include refusals to test,
which are considered to be positive, are the reason for the percentage range
provided.
- Approximately
18-22% of all post-accident tests are non-negative. This means that they are
either positive, adulterated with, tampered with or there is a prescription
medication involved that showed up on the test. The legitimate prescriptions
would be reported to the employer as negative once they are confirmed
- Approximately
20% of the positive post-accident test results are positive for alcohol at a
.04 level or higher.
The
following statistics are from the National Institute on Drug Abuse.
- Approximately
70-75% of drug and alcohol abusers are employed.
- Drug
using employees are- 2.5 times more to have absences of 8 days or more, 2.2
times more likely to request early dismissal or time off, 3 times more likely
to be late for work, 5 times more likely to file a workers’ compensation claim,
5 times more likely to use health insurance
coverage, 3.5 times more likely to be involved in workplace accidents, 10 times
more likely to miss work.
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