How many of us drive after enjoying the relaxation benefits of cannabis? Most people do. The real question is how long do you wait to drive after consuming cannabis? And how long should you wait?
The answer to these questions remain unclear in part because the body of research is still immature but also because our technological means to measure cannabis and its relation to impairment is inadequate.
Let’s say you partake at a friend’s house and drive home two hours later. If you get pulled over on a traffic stop and the police officer suspects you are impaired, how do they measure your impairment? If alcohol is involved, a breathalyzer provides accurate real-time results for the officer, assuming the test is conducted properly. Not so with cannabis.
You can give blood …show more content…
The challenge with urine tests is that they are unable to detect recent use so there is no reliable quantitative correlation to impairment as with the alcohol breathalyzer. The other challenge with urine is that police do not want to be urine specimen collectors.
Oral swabs have been shown to have accuracy rates between 52% to 100% according to a study conducted by the Drug Evaluation Classification (DEC) Program. Accuracy was measured by comparing oral swab tests with offsite blood test results. Researchers noted that the oral swab method is at this point the most reliable method of real-time testing for impairment because it can detect the psychoactive cannabis compounds indicating recent use but that the technology is still not developed enough to be considered reliable.
Unfortunately, these testing issues will also play out in the courts, where cannabis consumers will have to defend themselves by proving the inaccuracy of the various testing methods, including individual subjective police assessment (i.e. law enforcement