Patients that are sick enough to qualify for the medical marijuana card use it for MEDICAL reasons. They do NOT “get high”. It releives pain, nausea, muscle spasms.

I don’t know of a single medical marijuana patient that even THOUGHT of using their medicine DURING working hours.

Who said it was “easy” to get a medical marijuana card? Have you tried to get one? Have you called any marijuana clinics to see what the procedure is?

Let’s talk about employees high on Caffiene, sucking down Starbucks, Energy Drinks,
Does ” ROAD RAGE” ring a bell???

Let’s Tax & Regulate Coffee.

It’s not really about the consumption of anything, it’s about how any circumstance, event etc, affects us.

Further, I must add that my research indicates that the most prevalent factor for accidents in the workplace are exhaustion and stress, not drugs. When evaluating drug use in the workplace I found that overwhelmingly it is alcohol.

We do not need to sacrifice our Constitution (re unConstitutional random drug tests) but rather we need to educate our citizens.

Cigarette smoking has seen dramatic reductions in the last decade. Not thru seizing urine, not thru more restrictive laws… but rather thru a campaign of education. No homes raided, no overflowing corrections facilities, no shots fired – just a public education campaign.

How do you spell “Duh!”

The conservative approach suggested by Mr. Meneghello does not necessarily lead an employer to negligence claims any more than other prescription medications authorized by a physician. One of the biggest causes of impairment in the workforce is fatigue or lack of sleep, yet employers do not test for this type of impairment. To suggest that employers are subject to negligence claims when an employee does not show signs of impairment is a bit disingenuous.

States like Rhode Island prohibit workplace impairment testing unless the employer can articulate signs of impairment or some behavior that may show impairment. Just because an employer can find marijuana metabolites in an employees system is in no way an impairment test.

Eventually the day will come when prohibiting an employee from using a drug or herb prescribed by a doctor will have serious consequences for employers. Attorneys may make a living offering zealous employers advice. But really the best advise is easy and cheap, and that is to help each employee become productive, both at home and at work. No one wins when a employee is fired for not being impaired on the job, not society, not employees and not employers who have to retrain new employees when this occurs.

“In 2009, over 96 percent of people who applied for the card in Oregon were able to receive one. In other words, it’s a lot easier to get a medical marijuana card than it is to obtain a driver’s license.”

Your figures might be correct, but your assessment is way off. The reason why it appears to be “easier” is because you have to have medical records proving that you have one of the qualifying conditions to be on the program. If you call contracting cancer or glaucoma or any of the other valid conditions “easy” then, well… Most people know before applying for the program if their medical records prove that they have one of the recognized conditions, which is why they apply in the first place. If you can prove you have one or more qualifying conditions, the department cannot deny your application. So, what your figures really show, is that 4% of those that applied for the program did not have one of the qualifying conditions and were properly denied.

I am a big believer in workplace safety. I do not believe anybody should be impaired at the workplace regardless of the substance, legal or not. The presence of marijuana metabolites in a persons system does not necessarily indicate intoxication or impairment. Marijuana is a very unique drug when compared to just about all others in that it will stay in the users system for up to 30 days, depending on body fat content. Does anybody believe that if one consumes a drug that they are still impaired for up to 30 days after usage?

Cocaine, methamphetamine, heroin, oxycontin and morphine (among a very very large list) are way more impairing than marijuana, and more harmful to the body. Yet these drugs can be consumed a day or two before a drug test and it will not show up. They metabolize very quickly in the system. You are not catching those people unless they consume within 24 hours prior to the testing, yet you are catching people who have used marijuana within a month of testing. So I guess the message is if you want to do a drug and get away with it in the workplace, use a much harder and harmful drug than marijuana.

Our drug laws are very inconsistent, discriminatory and most of the time, miss the mark they are trying to “fix”. You can go get drunk and show up to work with a hangover, which IS impairment, and it’s ok. You can not get enough sleep and go to work drowsy, which IS imparment, and it’s ok. You can go fill a prescription for vicodin after dental work, pop a pill and go to work, which IS impairment, and it’s ok. I could play this game all day, but the point is, if you are REALLY concerned about workplace safety, I would say you are really missing the mark.

What’s the stance on the legal prescriptions Marinol and Cesamet? Marinol, and Cesamet are federally approved schedule 3 drugs which are available by prescription and contains the same primary active ingredients that is found in marijuana, THC. Why is it ok to discriminate against people who use the natural herb versus the synthetic active ingredient? Is Marinol or Cesamet somehow less impairing than marijuana?

If you are serious about workplace safety, is there something wrong with impairment testing? There are valid tests to show impairment regardless of the substance used and they would also catch the other people who are impaired via a hangover or lack of sleep. I know they use them in the trucking industry. Impaired is impaired whether it shows up in your bloodstream or not. It seems that a lot of business are really more interested in what people do on their “off” time than solving an impairment issue at work, because that’s all your drug tests do.

Thank goodness this country is slowly coming to the realization that all of the trillions of dollars that are spent on this nonsense is being wasted and all that we are doing is building up the industrial prison complex. Congratulations on having one of the highest incarceration rates in the free world. It’s really working, isn’t it.

Fire people who ARE impaired at work, regardless of the cause. Does the cause even matter?

If a patient is on Xanax, and they test positive for Xanax, they simply provide the prescription – and the employer isn’t even notified of the use. Many employees come to work while using Xanax, Prozac, Oxycontin, Vicodin, among others and are accepted by employers, society and peers as individuals needing those medicines to function daily. There is no actual “accommodation” for those medicines – nor is there a perceived need for one. Yet a medical marijuana patient is intentionally treated differently.

At one position I applied for and was offered a position, after providing proof of my OMMP registration to the drug testing facility, they then consulted with the employer to determine if they would “allow” my valid medical use of marijuana (at home – not in the workplace). The employer said “no.” Tell me any other drug that the average employer gets to decide if it is “okay” for an employee to use? No other drug validated through proof of “legitimate use” (the measure the testing facilities use) is even reported to the employer, to protect the employee’s health information. If I instead opted for dangerous narcotics, I could have carried them in my purse, taken them at my work-desk and been considered perfectly appropriate in the workplace and no one would bat an eye. Yet, with medical marijuana – you cannot even use it at home and still be appropriate in the workplace based on these standards.

While this article says the tides are turning towards employers validating the discrimination against medical marijuana patients, I would say that the ridiculous use of preferences in medical care to discriminate against any employee or potential employee is not only inappropriate, but illegal. If the courts haven’t made a clear decision on this yet – I feel confident that they WILL in the short term future. No employer should have a say in the medical preferences of its employees, EVER. What a horrible precedence it would be if an employer can determine what medical preferences are allowed and not allowed, and enforce through the loss of your employment?

If we allow this to continue in the direction this article suggests, the end result will be that your employer will be able to determine all your medical choices, which are private intimiate decisions to be left to the patient and doctor, NOT the employer OR the courts. While the employer has a stake in impairment in the workplace, the employer has no business being involved in your medical decisions. There are impairment tests available – employers just choose not to use them. It is my opinion that by using those impairment tests, employers would find that many of their employees are impaired through lack of sleep, excessively demanding work schedules and other factors completely unrelated to their medical preferences.

Jennifer Alexander

This stood out for me like a sore thumb in an otherwise reasonable and informative article. If you speak to treatment professionals, they will tell you that impairment is not difficult to spot at all. There is workplace impairment testing available that is quick, reasonably priced, and identifies impaired activity regardless of the cause. We should spend less time worrying about what might cause impairment in an employee, and put our efforts into training and other more productive ways to ensure a functional and safe workplace.

Many medications have the potential to impair employees. Being sick or having an untreated medical condition can also cause impairment. Patients often prefer medical marijuana to morphine, oxycontin, vicodin and many other pharmaceutical painkillers routinely prescribed and used legally. Patients prefer imarijuana because it has less harmful side effects and causes less mental impairment.

Patients qualified for the Oregon Medical Marijuana Program have been examined by a physician who recommended them to the program. The statement that it is easier to get a patient card than a drivers license is completely false and ridiculous. The Grants Pass Daily Courier had an investigative reporter try to get a card from four different clincs and found it was very difficult to get a card.

This issue calls for common sense not hysteria. Impairment testing should be developed. Impaired workers should be sent home regardless of the cause. But if you terminate employees based on what medicine provides them the best relief, you will lose many qualified, hard working, dilligent employees and that might ruin your business.

John Sajo
DIrector, Voter Power Foundation