One of my additional duties in the military was drug testing administrator, AKA the piss-test guru. I had the benefit of doing this at Fort Meade, Maryland, which is convenient to one of the two testing labs. We visited the lab as part of our training. That was pretty neat, actually. No, you can’t test “hot” after eating a poppy seed bagel. Or even a dozen.
Even better, we took a field trip to the Maryland addiction center. This is one of only two addiction treatment centers in the entire country that successfully treat addictions. 99% of the residents (they don’t like to say inmates) are convicted felons going through the program as rehab from prison. If they complete the program, they get a significant amount of time off their sentences. Every once in a while, they get a volunteer walk-in.
The minimum stay for the felons is 12 months. The minimum stay for volunteers is 6 months.
All those 30 day “rehab” programs you hear about accomplish precisely nothing. It takes 3-6 months for the addict to actually admit they have a problem. That’s after they dry out. Then it takes 3-6 months to actively deal with the problem and resolve the addiction.
Addiction never goes away. You just learn to fight it every hour of every day. Misdirection is important. Willpower has to be taught and exercised.
The long-term addicts then spend 3-6 months learning how to human, followed by 6 months of learning how to adult. Seriously. Some of these people have to be taught how to use a toilet, shower, eat with a fork, or even speak coherently.
Absolutely mistaken . You can test positive for opiates with poppy seeds, it was such a problem that the cutoff level for testing had to be changed to greater than 15000. I am a board certified MRO (medical review officer) and read drug screens for the largest urgent care in America for years. This is one of the questions on the board exam. Nowadays positive screening tests are sent for Gas chromatography and the level of opiates are checked to make sure they are below 15000. This is why poppy seed tests are negative. they do not give a level above 15000, but at one time they did turn the tests positive and caused great confusion. Especially tests that used thin layer chromatography. Overall, though, you are correct because poppy seeds will only produce low levels of opiates in urine
ReplyDeleteOddly enough, the Army used gas chromatographs to screen their urine samples more than 20 years ago, with a high enough baseline that the use of opiate drugs wouldn't register more than 24 hours later. So I am absolutely correct.
DeleteSaw an adult human walking naked in the street today. Drugs are bad.
ReplyDelete