Drug testing plan for jail workers hit

A mandatory drug testing program for 1,750 Cook County Jailemployees would be humiliating and probably not uncover chronicusers, a prominent substance abuse specialist testified yesterday.

"It may detect the person who used drugs once who just happenedto take it just before the test," said Dr. Sidney Schnoll, aprofessor of pharmacology and psychiatry at the Medical College ofVirginia.

Schnoll, who until recently was chief of a chemical dependencyunit at Northwestern Memorial Hospital, was testifying in behalf ofthe American Civil Liberties Union in a court challenge to a proposedtesting program.

The ACLU is asking U.S. District Judge Susan Getzendanner todeclare the program unconstitutional because it calls forunreasonable searches and unfairly jeopardizes an employee's job.The bench trial began yesterday.

He suggested that evidence of drug use could be discernedthrough behavior patterns like excessive absences, tardiness orineffectiveness on the job rather than through urine sampling.

Not only was it "quite embarrassing" to urinate in the presenceof someone not trained in the health care field, but it would be easyfor a drug addict to switch samples, Schnoll testified.