Vapor|25|They/Them

May I present the best apple:

... but ultimately, we will always choose Earth. We will always choose each other.

Houston CAPCOM: Integrity, from Earth - our single system, fragile and interconnected - we copy. Those of us that can, are looking back.

I keep seeing people dogpiling Robby for telling Langdon, “I don’t want you working in my ER,” but The Pitt is actually pretty medically accurate, including a lot of the stuff that you don’t see that’s happening in the background.

From a hospital standpoint, Langdon is a liability- not just because he’s a former drug addict, but because everything he does from now on is going to be scrutinized with extreme prejudice. Every narc he pulls, every waste he documents, every order he writes is going to be looked at sideways. If a patient says, “I never got my pain meds,” guess whose name is getting flagged first even if he did everything right? Langdon’s.

That means extra work for Robby as the one running the department. He’s going to have to triple check Langdon’s orders, triple check any narcotic discrepancies, and open an incident/investigation every time something even looks off. That’s chart reviews, Pyxis logs, witness statements, pharmacy calls, manager emails, the whole nine yards, over and over again.

Realistically, Langdon probably wouldn’t even be allowed to access the Pyxis anymore, which means someone else has to pull his meds, co-sign his wastes, and basically babysit his access. That slows everyone down, keeps patients from getting their meds in a timely manner, and drags other staff into the liability with him whether they like it or not.

On top of that, pharmacy audits are going to increase, “random” drug tests are going to ramp up, and the state/board/DEA are going to have their eyes on that unit. One bad outcome or one missing vial doesn’t just fall on Langdon, it lands on Robby, the ER, and the entire hospital. People can and do lose their licenses, their jobs, and their reputations over this kind of thing.

And that’s before you even get into optics: if a patient or family finds out their doctor has a history of diverting drugs, they’re not going to calmly say “oh, good for his recovery.” They’re going to complain, demand another doctor, maybe call risk management or an attorney. Administration hates that kind of attention, and it puts a target on Robby for “allowing” it in his department at the Attending.

And even beyond dangerous jobs, people are generally more productive when sober than when they are drunk, so it makes sense why companies would want to select for people who are sober

Drug tests do not actually stop anyone from coming into work drunk/high or whatever. Like in your own example, the crane operator is already employed and already drunk at work, so, a drug screen would not be relevant in this scenario. These drug screens fail at the one thing they are purported to be good for, which is preventing someone from coming into work impaired.

Now, let's put any conversations about the ethics of coming to work impaired aside. It may seem like that's what we're discussing here, but it isn't.

We are talking about a potential employer looking in your pee to see if you have ingested 'illegal' drugs at all, at anytime in the last couple weeks.

It does not matter if the drugs in question are even illegal anymore, it does not matter if the drugs were taken outside of work. The fact that employment can be withheld because a substance I bought legally, and was consumed in the privacy of my own home, is absurd.

This practice disproportionately harms marginalized people, people who have chronic pain, who struggle with poor mental health, and people of color especially. It is a hold over from the days where Reefer Madness was in theaters, it is designed solely to filter out 'degenerate stoners hippies and other delinquents' and again.

@ho_mori