CBD Drug Tests
Published 12 Mar 2020

The cannabis revolution is sweeping industry. As more states legalize and the federal government teeters ever closer, tens of millions of workers from all sectors are questioning how drug testing will affect the workplace. Those who use cannabidiol, or CBD, even lab-tested CBD oil products can sometimes fail drug tests for cannabis in some scenarios. Many such cases actually exist.

Urine tests, the most common drug screen in the workplace, do not actually look for CBD. Not at all. CBD does not intoxicate or impair motor skills or judgement. Instead, despite your every effort to buy hemp oil online, it is possible to fail for the active ingredient in cannabis it does test for: Tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC, the psychoactive compound responsible for the “high” of marijuana.

THC and CBD are not the same. Drug tests are not even remotely interested in screening for CBD, but since it derives from cannabis plants, even hemp, it contains trace amounts of THC. This quantity, although too low to make you “high,” might show up on test results. THC exists in low quantities in some lab-tested CBD products, not all, where it persists for weeks in the human body.

Why Fail You Though?

If tests pick up lingering traces of THC, I mean, it clearly states that quantities are minimal, insufficient to render anybody stoned, who exactly is at fault? Product labels frequently mislabel compounds. According to the U.S. National Library of Medicine, CBD is largely unregulated. This market misstates THC levels regularly, leaving consumers vulnerable.

However, the unregulated market may prove hazardous, but the regulated, legal industry is much safer. Lab-tested CBD products with accurate results are worth their weight in gold. Licensed dispensaries and recreational stores sell regulated products in an industry that mandates the testing of every product in its marketplace. Furthermore, quality comes assured. Unregulated products seldom even contain CBD.

While drug tests screen for THC, they will detect THC present, even if in miniscule traces. It is incredibly important that you buy oil online only if it comes from a legal, licensed, accountable supplier. The only way to know what is in your CBD is to test it independently, which is why all go through third-party laboratories to analyze cannabinoid, terpene, flavonoid, and even contaminant profiles of products.

You cannot trust the labeling of just any CBD you find today. You cannot even know if it actually has any CBD in it. Unfortunately, unless you buy CBD isolate, most CBD products do have residual THC to fail you. Often, failure can result in loss of job and income opportunities, even stabilities, as well as the loss of resource access, such as child custody, prescription drugs, and even government benefits.

How Drug Screening Works

CBD will not fail your drug test, but any residual THC in the product you buy could potentially fail you. These tests do not even test for CBD, only THC. Mostly, these tests involve testing urine samples, sent to a drug testing company by employers, who collect them from employees. There it goes through a specialized machine that measures trace compounds in the fluid.

Technicians specifically look for a byproduct of THC as evidence. Occasionally, employers may gather hair, saliva, and even blood samples to send for testing. This is how federal life works. Any federal employee positive for more than even a trace residue of THC-COOH, a THC metabolite, fails. To be clear, “trace” refers specifically to only 50 billionths of a gram per milliliter of urine, which is frankly irrelevant.

Fear Old Technology

Older tests easily, almost certainly falsely identify THC in samples containing pure CBD isolate, which is just CBD alone, nothing else at all. Be wary of them. Cautious. Alert. Also called gas-chromatography mass-spectrometry with trifluoracetic anhydride, a derivatization agent, or TFAA, they are notoriously unreliable, giving thousands of false positive every year just from this error on its own.

Further, older methods of extraction may still contain traces of THC. Supercritical CO2 extraction technology is the latest, and currently only, true way to get pure and specific cannabinoids. It is possible to find THC-free products, but most are full-spectrum, which is a combination of various cannabinoids, including THC, for medical benefits even more effective and miraculous.

Today, with hemp now legal at the federal level, as explained in the Farm Bill of 2018, the law now distinguishes cannabis in both THC-rich and CBD-rich terms. Marijuana and industrial hemp belong to the same family, containing the same cannabinoids and other compounds. However, hemp, under its legal definition, contains less than .3 percent THC, certainly no more.

This means that even hemp-derived CBD products can contain up to .3 percent THC, although likely to be notably less. The only way to know is to make sure that you buy lab-tested CBD products, with certified analysis by an independent laboratory. You will know exactly what that product contains, its exact THC and CBD levels, as well as any other compounds that might be present.

Buy Hemp Oil Online

An abundance of quality, lab-tested CBD oil products are available online, if you know where to look. The future of cannabis testing will likely become obsolete, but in the interim, a clear distinction is appearing between THC and CBD. Tests will improve, and officers, employers, companies, and even staff themselves are all becoming wiser. It is unlikely that folks will fail for trace THC in the future.

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