Alcohol and Drug Testing Rates To Remain Unchanged

The minimum percentage rate for substance-abuse testing for next year will remain at 25 percent of covered aviation employees for random drug testing and 10 percent for random alcohol testing. The rates will remain unchanged because historical data indicates that the positive rate for drug tests over the last several years has been less than 1 percent. Last year, the random drug test positive rate was 0.56 percent and the random alcohol test violation rate was 0.10 percent. If either of these violation rates had been 1 percent or higher, the testing rates might have jumped to 50 percent of covered employees, according to the FAA.