To test or not to Test?

Jessica Deutsch

English 1022

Brian Lewis



To Test or Not to Test


Even though testing urine for drugs can be a very helpful and try to get mothers back on the right track, it also can be very discriminatory. There have been a lot of cases in which doctors will only send reports to the police of women who were low income minorities. In the poor community hospitals many minority women were tested without their consent or knowledge. Hospitals in a middle or upper class community the women who were found using illicit drugs made referrals to social services but not to the police (Gostin). In the case of Ferguson vs. the City of Charleston devised a policy which stated which type of woman should be tested for drugs. They targeted, “women who had obtained no prenatal care or late or incomplete prenatal care, and women known to have previously abused drugs or alcohol abuse” (Gostin). This is looked at to be very discriminatory to all women. It isn’t fair that only low income woman and past drug abuser women should only be tested for drugs while being pregnant. In 2001 the Supreme Court overturned the Ferguson vs. the City of Charleston saying public hospitals cannot give woman drug tests without a warrant, and turning positive urine results into the police (Gostin). They believe that this would be violating the fourth amendment against unreasonable searches. The start of testing pregnant women for drugs on a regular basis can result them to consider more abortions then trying to get treatment. I think this is very true if women that are on drugs know that they will be tested all the time for drugs, and then maybe potentially turned into the police if found positive, they won’t want to go to the doctor anymore, and getting an abortion would be a better case then dealing with the consequences with the police.
In theory trying to get women help while pregnant would be the best guess to trying to protect the mother and the fetus, but at the same time it may also cause discriminatory acts against women not of the middle or upper class, and cause women to get abortions because they don’t want to get in trouble with the law. I agree that women should be tested for drugs in the sake of the baby, but it shouldn’t just be certain women it should be every single woman no matter what race, or class!



Gostin, Lawrence O. "Testing Pregnant Women for Drug Abuse Is Discriminatory."
San Diego: Greenhaven Press, 2005. Opposing Viewpoints Resource Center.
Web. 29 Jan. 2010