
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, February 13, 1991                   TAG: 9102130073
SECTION: BUSINESS                    PAGE: B-5   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Newsday
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

FEWER WORKERS FAIL DRUG TESTS/

The percentage of employees and job applicants who failed drug tests administered by a major drug testing laboratory has declined yearly from 1987 to 1990, according to a study made public by the lab Tuesday.

About 11 percent of the workers and job applicants who took SmithKline Beecham Clinical Laboratories' drug tests last year tested positive for drug use, the company said. This compares with 18.1 percent in 1987, 13.6 percent in 1988, and 12.7 percent in 1989.

Last year, SmithKline tested about 1.9 million employees and would-be employees for use of one or more of 10 drugs. Marijuana, found in 34 percent of the failed tests, and cocaine, found in 24 percent, were the most widely discovered substances.

The decline mirrors other recent studies that indicate decreased drug use in the general population, said Stacey Reynolds, associate director of the Rockville, Md.-based American Council for Drug Education, a non-profit group. Reynolds said the recent results could show that the national effort to educate the public about the ill effects of drug abuse is beginning to pay off.

Tobey Dichter, a spokeswoman for SmithKline, a unit of the SmithKline Beecham pharmaceutical and health-care company, also suggested that the introduction of drug testing in work places might have helped.

But Susan Jacobs, a lawyer for the Legal Action Center, a New York City-based advocacy group, said other factors could have played a role in the falling rate of positive drug-use tests.

There is a greater awareness among workers about how to get around the tests, she said, and greater availability of corporate counseling programs to help employees kick drug habits.

by CNB