When it comes to your kids — or in the case of business owners, your employees — would you want to know whether they're using drugs?

According to Chris Backeberg, programme director and licensed addiction counsellor at Benedict Associates, often times drug use can be very subtle.

This is when the benefits of the long standing and oh-so-controversial practice of random drug testing come into effect — but results have to mean more than just a pass or fail.

"It's all about assessment," he says. "The truth is, if someone fails a drug test. What does that really tell you about them? You know they're using an illegal drug but you don't know to what extent, you don't know anything about the extent the drug is impacting their ability to function professionally or personally. They just failed a drug test."

Substance use, he explains, is on a continuum — from substance use to substance abuse and then chemical dependency.

"Chemical dependency is a mental health disorder. People who are chemically dependent are considered vulnerable adults until they get treatment in the United States," Mr. Backeberg continues. "Most 16 year olds who test positive for marijuana aren't even going to be close to that. They're using or abusing, depending on how you want to label that, and I think that's the big picture."

There's a lot of controversy surrounding random drug testing — many people might want to cite how it impinges on civil liberties and what they do in their own time is their business and no one else's, but that neglects to take into account certain factors, like how the correlation between drug use and criminal behaviour, violent behaviour and deteriorating levels of mental health have begun to climb.

And if that isn't scary enough to start your thought process, Mr. Backeberg avers: "What I can tell you is that if you have 100 students, the data says that 10 of them are going to be having problems by the time they're 16, with substance and chemical dependency."

It starts with the children. It starts at home and at school.

"Random drug testing in schools is seen as a modern day, very realistic approach to the whole issue of drug and alcohol prevention for obvious reasons," he says. "Sometimes even parents require drug testing — we've got a number of families who are saying to their kids we're not paying for you to go to college if you fail a drug screen. Random drug testing is a good indicator of what's going on but what has to follow is assessment."

Obviously, a huge deterrent. An example he cites — airline pilots: "They're less likely to smoke a joint because they're exposed to random drug testing. So you've got a deterrent and therefore people are using less."

Another advantage of drug testing — it can be a validation process. "This one guy had lied to his family so many times, they didn't believe him anymore. If they ask are you drinking, and he says, no, they don't know," Mr. Backeberg notes. "So what he's really come to rely on, and what he loves getting is clean drug scans, because he can hold them up and say 'I'm clean'. It helps families build back trust."

Another nugget of information he picked up while at a conference last year was that 10th graders across the United States were reporting that one of the reasons they liked the drug testing was because it gave them an out.

"They'll be at a party and someone would say, 'Here, have a toke,' and they could say, 'I can't do that because my school random drug tests'. It gives them a viable, valid way to stand up and hold their head hight without being labelled or picked on — because you know peer pressure at that age group is through the roof," he says.

It's all about being cool and fitting in — you remember what that felt like. The pressure to be one of the crowd can be overwhelming and can override the morals you hope you instilled in your child. Fitting in means more to most kids than passing grades or even not getting arrested. That old fear just isn't getting through anymore.

"So when we're doing assessments with young people in particular, we're starting to look at their relationships with people around them because substance abuse early on leads to relationship difficulties," Mr. Backeberg explains. "They're less likely to get picked up by the police and more likely to run into social problems at school or at home and so we look for that."

The problem of drug use in society is a cultural thing. From kids getting kicked out of boarding schools to our not-so-new and definitely not flattering reputation, "Bermudians love to drink", we struggle with it.

"I think the big challenge for kids is that it's so acceptable in their circles, and it always has been in our country.

"If you asked a Bermudian about drug testing, many of them will comment about civil liberties and the right to do what they want to do, and they won't hear or think about the big picture — they're feeding into the denial of the monster of the drug trade, and the drug trade, as you know, is brutal," he says. "The argument for drug free workplaces is a simple one and to the average person it makes a lot of sense.

"It's not what you do it's how you do it and that's what they're interested in, the mechanics of it. But for schools, you're messing with people's kids and I think there is a soft spot in our culture when you start talking about people's kids. There's a reflection on the parents, there's a lot of stigma and shame by parents living vicariously through their kids.

"And I don't know that you're going to get an argument from parents that they're going to be drug tested for illegal drugs. I know you'll get an argument for some but I would imagine most parents would be more than happy to see that. Press back would be with the kids. And understand the press back goes against their culture, and their culture is our culture."

Drug testing becomes not just a deterrent, but also a useful tool to figure out what's going on. But as a culture and a community we need to decide what are we going to do with that information.

"All drug testing does is really help us assess risk, we're assessing risk and we're trying to minimise it," he says. "It's not what you do but how you do it. As long as it's done consistently and fairly. And the reason you have policy is because the policy identifies exactly the ground rules because if you don't have exact ground rules you're going to treat people different each time and if you treat people differently each time you'll be discriminating, it's human nature.

"It's the same with our drugs in the workplace and it's very specific with how it works. And what happens when you fail a test. That's probably the most important piece of information for most people, what happens if I fail. Does it go on my record and who gets to see that?"

Back to your impressionable kids. "Kids need to feel like they're in control, you can't take it from them because if you do they're going to take it back surreptitiously," he admits.

This is exactly what he tries to do with his patients, putting the onus back on themselves by getting them to realise they're breaking their own, internal rules, rather those than everyone around them.

"Start talking about drugs and alcohol real matter of fact, as if they already exist in your house.

"Talk about them like you do about mowing the lawn. You should be doing the same with sex but certainly drugs and alcohol. You end up with a much more realistic view of what's going on."