Pentagon warns poppy seeds might cause troops to fail drug tests

https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2023/02/22/poppy-seeds-drug-test-military/

by bookofjoe • 3 years ago

14 26 3 years ago

bookofjoe• 3 years ago

h2odragon• 3 years ago

there exit harmless herbal supplements that will likely result in false positives for many of the drugs on standard tests.

Had a buddy in rehab who wanted to screw around with them; so we researched and made up a "vitamin powder" he could put in his milkshakes there (and share freely: totally innocent, non-narcotic blah stuff). Which resulted in lighting up his urine tests like a Christmas tree. Poppy seeds, valerian root, morning glory ... i forget the rest. not much was needed.

It was hilarious but then they started doing the blood tests on him and kept him a while longer to counsel him on his attitude. Epic stunts may sometimes be worth the cost.

eindiran• 3 years ago

non-narcotic

It is possible to get high on each one of the items you listed there... Morning glory contains LSA, which will trigger LSD tests (but can get you high in its own right). As a side note, most common drug tests do not test for LSD. Valerian root contains a number of GABAergic alkaloids, though I don't believe it will trigger any of the tests for GABAergic drugs like eg alcohol or benzodiazepines. Again, neither of those are in the most common drug test panels. And poppy seeds need to be washed to get the opiate alkaloids off: people use unwashed poppy seeds to make poppy tea recreationally. PST is functionally equivalent to taking opium orally.

Even if this so-called vitamin powder was intended to be a joke, it was absolutely not non-narcotic.

shagie• 3 years ago

Back in August of '96 when I had just moved out to California and started the onboarding for working at Taos, the group of us who were new hires that week (a dozen) were sitting in a conference room with some bagels.

Some of the bagels were poppy seed and one of my new-coworkers commented "well, guess we're not doing drug tests."

The "what can cause false positives" is a "this should be well known" and if someone has a positive result and claims that they've eaten poppy seeds, then get a hair sample and test that.

If you're in an industry that is likely to have random drug tests, it may be wise to avoid poppy seeds.

https://www.usada.org/spirit-of-sport/education/can-poppysee...

Scoundreller4• 3 years ago

If you're in an industry that is likely to have random drug tests, it may be wise to change organizations/industry

FTFY

anaganisk• 3 years ago

I dont want a high pilot on my flight. But it becomes a problem when the pilot, who is a good aviator, is addicted to something due to depression. The tests are the only way it can be caught. If the pilot was ethical/morally competent, he wouldn't have taken anything before a flight at least longtime before it. It's wise to change, yes, but how many people in denial will do that.

maldev3• 3 years ago

My field of tech is strict no drug. The level of job security and salaries this provides is insane. FAANG salaries, and a tenth of the work(if that) compared to private sector. Along with being near impossible to get fired or laid off and all I have to do is not smoke a doobie.

torstenvl4• 3 years ago

We sent out a Brady notice on this recently. It appears that one or more major sources of poppy seed imports are contaminated with poppy latex, possibly due to improper washing during the harvest and processing of the seeds. Some brands are more susceptible than others.

Important to note this isn't a false positive (i.e., not a problem with lab procedures). I don't know the medical side of this, but at least some of the toxicologists I spoke with were concerned that, at sufficient quantities, affected individuals could experience adverse health events based on consumption of the contaminated poppy seeds.

(Also: the DoD reporting cutoff for codeine was already significantly higher than the industry standard, to try to eliminate or minimize the possibility of this happening.)

gus_massa3• 3 years ago

but at least some of the toxicologists I spoke with were concerned that, at sufficient quantities, affected individuals could experience adverse health events based on consumption of the contaminated poppy seeds.

Did they give you hard numbers? Is that 1 poppy seed? 1 teaspoon of poppy seed? 1 pound of poppy seed?

The dose makes the poison. The problem is that the tests are oversensitive. It's like failing a drug test due to a coffee in the morning because it may be an excuse to be taking pure caffeine pills.

torstenvl4• 3 years ago

Did they give you hard numbers? Is that 1 poppy seed? 1 teaspoon of poppy seed? 1 pound of poppy seed?

As I clearly explained, this is due to contamination, possibly due to poor washing. The quantity needed is therefore going to depend on the level of contamination.

The problem is that the tests are oversensitive.

The DoD has been operating on a 2000ng/mL cutoff, which is high, so... no.

Also, the food supply is contaminated with opiates and your first thought is that the tests are too sensitive?

gtvwill• 3 years ago

Pinged positive for opiates because of a load of poppy seeds on some 7 seed bread. Was living in a car at the time while hunting work on the other side of country. Ate half the loaf in one day. Turns out it was enough. Still got the job. Boss was understanding.

It was this stuff. https://shop.coles.com.au/a/national/product/coles-bakery-br...

Scoundreller4• 3 years ago

Coles Online is not available in your country or access has been blocked

What is it that they don’t want us to know in Canada?

testTED• 3 years ago

Likely that they're setting cookies or using fingerprinting scripts.

aquarium872• 3 years ago

Kids use this trick to get high. Unfortunately if they are used to washed batches of poppies seeds and then get a poorly washed batch, it is often enough to kill them when consuming their normal quantity.

The LD50 is only about 4x the recreational dose of heroin. So this is a dangerous class of drugs to play around with if the intent is to get high

dav_Oz• 3 years ago

It was very common in Eastern Europe during the Soviet time. For instance it is still referred to as "kompot" (original meaning: a popular type of fruit drink) in Poland. The phenomenon is also generally known as "Polish Heroin"[0].

For this Poppy straws - the whole dried plant with everything but the seeds - are used which are far more richer in opiate alkaloids.

In 1927, a Hungarian successfully chemically extracted opiate alkaloids from just using the crushed capsules [1]. Today 90% of all legally derived morphine is through poppy straw concentrate (PCS) [2].

[0]https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polish_heroin

[1]https://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/data-and-analysis/bulletin/bu...

[2]https://www.unodc.org/documents/wdr/WDR_2008/WDR2008_100year...

aquarium872• 3 years ago

Very cool. Working with a known unwashed product is much safer.

Pentagon warns poppy seeds might cause troops to fail drug tests

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