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Weekly Wrap: A New Workplace Trend – Mandatory Tests for Smokers
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The workplace push to get smokers to quit is starting to ruffle some feathers in Arizona.
According to a story this week in the Arizona Republic, “Some Maricopa County employees are fuming over a new health-plan requirement forcing them to submit saliva for nicotine analysis, saying the exam is an invasion of privacy and could be used to collect other sensitive health information.”
This is a touchy issue, because getting employees to focus on healthier habits – whether it be quitting smoking, eating healthier, or working out more – gets into the issue of influencing what people do when they are off the clock, away from work, and in the privacy of their own home. How can an employer regulate such behavior anyway? Is it really any of their business?
Well, more and more employers are saying it is, especially given how an employee’s private behavior (say, packing away the junk food and smoking like a chimney) has an impact on their health, which ultimately has an impact on the employer’s health plan costs.
For the most part, employers have enlisted more voluntary methods to get their workers to change their unhealthy ways – perhaps offering incentives to stop smoking, or subsidized gym memberships to get them to exercise more – but as health care costs increase and federal mandates loom, a number of employers are taking a more serious (some would say punitive) approach toward changing unhealthy employee behaviors.
The nicotine test for public workers in Maricopa County, Arizona (where Phoenix is located), seems to be part of this more serious approach. The newspaper writes:
The test is intended to reveal whether those being insured are smokers. Employees who decline it are penalized with higher medical-insurance premiums, while those testing negative for tobacco use are spared a premium that is $480 higher per year…
“It seems to be the trend we’re seeing,” said Michelle Gorman, a supervisor in the health-promotion and wellness department for Blue Cross Blue Shield of Arizona. “It’s another progression in the whole smoke-free initiative that we’re seeing. It’s quick and non-invasive, it’s just a swab.”
However, some county workers say they cannot afford to refuse the test, and others fear the medical information gleaned from the exams will be used against them or shared with others.
“They gotta do what they gotta do, but it is kind of an invasion of our privacy,” said smoker Dee Webber, a county accounting employee.
Another county employee who requested anonymity for fear of retribution called it “abusive and an infringement of my rights.” She was among a handful of employees – including some on smoking breaks – hanging out at the county administration building in downtown Phoenix recently who thought their employer should be barred from collecting the samples.”
The required nicotine tests represent a ramping up of the employee monitoring process, because “in the past, Maricopa County’s health plan asked employees to fill out paperwork declaring they do not use nicotine. But county officials said the number of employees who self-reported as nicotine users appeared to be too low. They implemented the saliva testing as an attempt to “put some accountability in the program,” said Chris Bradley, director of the county’s Business Strategies and Healthcare Program.”
So is this an isolated incident or wave of the future, a trend that we are going to see spread throughout America? Unfortunately, I think it is a trend we’ll be seeing more of, and it will only add to workplace tensions. Plus it will turn into another compliance issue for HR to worry about – something your HR pro needs like another hole in the head.
But there’s a lot more in the news this week than monitoring smokers in the workplace. Here are some other HR and workplace-related items you may have missed. This is TLNT’s weekly round-up of news, trends, and insights from the world of HR and talent management. Yes, I do it so you don’t have to.