Independence Day Special: This Is Your Country on Drugs

PISSING RITE

Beating The Drug Test Might Be As Simple As H20

Every day, laboratories across the nation inspect thousands of vials of
reekin' piss, all to weed out job candidates who might dabble in illicit
drugs. Drug-testing firms tend to go after pot-inhalers in particular. It's
the easiest drug to detect and the most commonly used.

"There would be no testing industry if it weren't for marijuana," says Dr.
John P. Morgan, co-author of Marijuana Myths, Marijuana Facts and professor
of pharmacology at the City University of New York Medical School. "The
number of positives would be so low that nobody would pay to test. After
all, urine testing is a $2 billion industry in the Unites States, so
marijuana is critical."

Bud lovers try inventive methods to nab the new job, preserve the habit and
maintain their right to privacy. Some have been known to smuggle a hidden
bag of drug-free urine and rig their undies with a hose. But increasingly,
these smokers are turning to the free market, fueling a multimillion-dollar
boom among purveyors of anything that claims to help, whether it does or not.

One market leader is "The Clean Machine," a pre-testing kit available over
the Internet from a company called Extreme Enterprises, LLC, which has
offices in Garland, Texas, and Northridge. It promises that its dietary
supplements can rid urine and blood of toxins while "promoting a holistic
approach to better health." Says company CEO Travis Buchanan, "The average
time to remove toxins from the system is 30 to 90 days. But our line is
designed to act as an accelerator and speed up the body's natural cleansing
process."

The 30-year-old Texan and admitted marijuana-smoker says several "herb
masters" helped him concoct these advanced tablets. "I can't reveal my
sources, but that's their forte," says Buchanan, who used to work for a lab
that conducted pre-employment drug tests.

He offers a menu of programs based upon your level of toxin intake. For
instance, there's X-treme ($99), a six-day program for daily users, and
Seek-N-Destroy ($49) for the one-time-a-week-or-less user. The curriculum
is challenging: You have to avoid all drugs for at least 48 hours, swallow
10 pills every hour for 10 hours over the course of three to six days,
stick to a strict high-protein, low-fat diet and drink gallons of water and
cranberry juice.

The company also provides a self-drug-test kit for extra peace of mind, and
if you're in dire need of advice, you can always contact a "personal
customer service coach" - they're available 24/7.

Dr. Morgan is skeptical that such cleansing kits do any cleansing. The key,
he says, is flushing out your system. "There's no scientific proof that
anything you swallow will rid you of marijuana metabolites. What all these
products do recommend is to consume large amounts of water and cranberry
juice. When you do that, you are diluting the concentration of drugs in
your system."

The occasional pot smoker doesn't really need artificial help, adds Dr.
Stuart Bogema, a chief toxicologist with Advanced Toxicology Network, a
subsidiary of an occupational health company called Concentra, which
provides drug-testing services in the L.A. area. Bogema says the body will
naturally clear itself of metabolites within two to three days - not the
purported one to three months.

Christine Pelisek contributed to this story.

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