'DRUGGED DRIVING' ISSUE UNDER DEBATE IN CONGRESS

Under the Influence

WASHINGTON - Citing estimates that 11 million people sometimes drive
under the influence of illegal drugs, a growing chorus in Congress
wants the government to do something about it.

The states are wary. Eight states now have specific laws on "drugged
driving," but their statutes are vague. None specifies an equivalent
level to the 0.08 percent blood content that Congress established as
the legal level for alcohol impairment.

That's partly because there's no roadside test to detect the presence
of drugs in the body - no handy "breathalyzer" as there is for
alcohol. And even if blood or urine samples taken at a hospital test
positive for drugs, there's no standard for how high is too high to
drive. "Zero tolerance" is the level some lawmakers want Con-gress
to establish. A motorist found to have any controlled substance in his
or her system would be considered unlawfully impaired.

"Everyone who drives is affected by this," said Rep. Rob Portman,
R-Ohio, citing a report last September by the Department of Health and
Human Services estimating that during the previous year nearly 11
million people drove at one time or another under the influence of
drugs. The same survey said three times as many people - 33.5 million
- - drove under the influence of alcohol in 2002.

Eight states already have drug-impairment laws, according to the
American Prosecutors Research Institute. They are Arizona, Georgia,
Indiana, Iowa, Illinois, Minnesota, Rhode Island and Utah.