That is completely fair to want more info and I agree the article should have explained this. Here’s the thing no CAP/CLIA certified lab would ever release screening results without a note directly on the results saying that said results are only for screening purposes. The key here is that screening tests will not hold up in court. It would be business suicide and against regulations to do otherwise. I do know from personal experience that LabCorp generally charges $70-$90 for a limited urine drug screen and that confirmation testing which should be reflexively run for all screening positives can run between $150-350ish range depending on the drug. We’re talking that price per drug per confirmation test. So I’m fairly sure the prison was being a bunch of cheap bastards and ignored what Quest told them. The fact that Quest noticed the result trends in their reagents before the company producing the reagent did tells me that their on point with their QA/QC. If this was a major reagent provider like Abbott or Siemens then this issue would have been noticed country wide real quick, but I’m guessing that this was some sort of third party reagent for something more esoteric like oxycodone testing. But that’s just a hunch on my part. I’m more pissed off that once again the lab is getting blamed for people doing whatever the fuck they want with testing results when the lab community does so much fucking work that’s never seen or appreciated to keep people safe. Also pisses me off that screening testing is used to trap and incarcerate innocent people who don’t know or understand that they’re being fucked. Thanks for listening while I shake my pipette in fury at the sky here.

I guarantee there was some kind of schmoozing or kickbacks involved.