Can You Pass A Drug Test With Someone Else's Urine?

Have you ever tried to beat a drug test? OR Labs are usually able to bust people using someone else's urine.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:02):
Welcome to brain Stuff from How Stuff Works. Hey, brain
stuff is Christian saga here. Let's say you are a
user of illicit drugs. You've applied for a job and
a drug tests required as a condition for employment. Even
in states where recreational marijuana is legal, employment can still
be denied to people who use it as well as

(00:24):
you know, of course harder drugs. You're thinking of borrowing
a buddy's urine maybe, or more extremely ordering clean urine
off the internet. But will that actually let you pass
the test? A lot depends on the collection in detection
methods used by the lab in question. Let's say you
successfully get the urine in the deposit cup within the

(00:47):
allotted time. Would you get away with it? Well? In
this case probably not. Reputable drug testing facilities followed Department
of Transportation guidelines which require collectors to establish a chain
of custody, which involves taking an immediate temperature reading of
the specimen. So while exterior proximity to your body might

(01:09):
keep the urine on the warm side, it's not likely
that it would have fallen anywhere near the required temperature range.
The DOT also requires that nothing should be taken inside
the collection area. No purses, backpacks, or outerwear pockets must
also be emptied. Sometimes workers also conduct a visual examination,

(01:31):
checking specifically the top of the belt line and sock areas,
because those are the most commonplaces people store fake and
borrowed urine. Apparently, but there's no limit to what people
will do to beat a drug test. Some will buy
powdered urine on the internet to mix with water. Most
facilities do tests in rest rooms without water access to

(01:54):
worth this in addition to not allowing people to take
any water inside, so they also try to add water
from the toilet tank. The end result is a bluish
green sample because d O T guidelines require that there's
blue tank water coloring in these toilet tanks for exactly
this purpose. Now, others may buy a product that claims

(02:16):
to cleanse your urine, but all it really does is diluted,
or they'll get some underwear that has a space to
hold the fake urine. It's not surprising, then, that some
facilities conduct observed testing, where a worker is present to
actually witness the deposit, either from the very beginning or
after a deceptive attempt has been made. Of course, if

(02:39):
the lab doesn't observe strict standards, it may still be
possible to game the system. Today's episode was written by
Aliya Hoyt, produced by Tristan McNeil and For more on
this and other topics, please visit us at how stuff

(03:00):
dot com