Transportation Industry News Winter
2018 Wholesale Baker Owes Mixed-Fleet Drivers Overtime Wages 3 A Trailer is Not a Warehouse 4 Are Unmanned “Ghost” Ships the 5 Future of International Trade? Team Directory 7
FMCSA Responds to the Opioid Epidemic Rocky Rogers | rocky.rogers@smithmoorelaw.com This should come as no surprise to anyone that follows
over the past twenty years. While that study did not
local or national news with any sort of frequency—
directly relate the presence of opioids as a cause of the
America is in the grips of an opioid epidemic. In fact,
fatal crashes, it is commonly understood that opioids
most local and national television outlets have recurring stories on the problem. While overdoses are the most frequent topic of conversation, and understandably so with close to 50,000 opioid-related overdose deaths reported in 2016, the epidemic presents another safety issue—impaired drivers behind the wheel. One recent
can slow reaction time, increase drowsiness, and impair thinking and motor skills, all of which can contribute to fatal accidents. The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, like many other federal, state, and local agencies, is responding to the epidemic. Effective January 1, 2018,
study from researchers at Columbia University found,
the Department of Transportation (“DOT”) drug-testing
now more than ever before, individuals killed in motor
program detailed in 49 C.F.R. Part 40 will include
vehicle accidents are testing positive for opioids, with
screening for four semi-synthetic opioids: hydrocodone,
one population segment exhibiting a seven-fold increase
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