The only type of occupation where a person is legally required to give their employer any and all details of their current drug use as directed by a medical professional is when they are applying to work in a public safety job – as in firefighters or police officers and other careers of that standing. Despite the fact that testing is mandatory there are limitations on the tests themselves that can actually be performed. For example, the federal guidelines surrounding drug tests stated that only six categories of drugs can be tested for, and among those six synthetic painkillers like Vicodin or Xanax or many other carefully controlled prescriptions are not included. What is funny about this is that most employers do not know that the tests they are requiring of their employees does not include those synthetics.

The companies assume that because there is a test for opiates that these synthetic opiates are tested for as well, but that is not true, the test actually only looks for codeine and morphine and not ALL Opiates. This is actually a large hole in the testing industry because for long people have been under the impression that the test for opiates did also include those things and since it does not many employers are hiring people that are actually violating the companies drug policies. But since the current state of drug testing does not include all opiates there isn’t much a company can do about it until they are aware of the hole in the testing industry. It’s more amusing to note that the opiates that aren’t being tested for are the ones that most doctors consider to be the most widely abused opiates.