Doctors’ group presses for mandatory LTO drug tests

A group of physicians urged the Land Transportation Office (LTO) to keep drug testing a mandatory requirement for all driver’s license applicants, saying it would minimize drug-related road accidents.

Dr. Nestor Laceda, spokesman for a mandatory drug testing advocate group, expressed concern over reports that Transportation and Communications Secretary Pantaleon Alvarez and LTO chief Edgardo Abenina would be seeking an amendment to the law on mandatory drug testing to make it optional or voluntary.

Laceda said such an amendment would only weaken the campaign to keep motorists under the influence of drugs off the streets.

He also clarified the wrong perception that abstinence from drug use for a period of three to five days would enable a user to avoid yielding positive results in a drug test.

"For the information of these two gentlemen, abstinence will not always yield negative results because everything depends upon the body metabolism of each drug user," Laceda said.

He pointed out that drug addicts cannot abstain from taking drugs for a period of more than 24 hours.

"A motorist driving under the heavy influence of illegal drugs is a danger not only to himself but to other motorists and their passengers around him," Laceda said.

He noted that initial implementation of drug tests for drivers applying for licenses had already been successful in identifying drug users among the examinees. – Rainier Allan Ronda