Bill Flannery, Navy Alcohol and Drug Abuse Prevention Branch director, spoke about the characteristics of alcohol and drug abuse in the Navy during the first session Tuesday of the NADAP Summit at Sasebo Naval Base’s Harbor View Club. (Greg Tyler / S&S)
SASEBO NAVAL BASE, Japan — If sailors abuse drugs, they will get caught and receive the boot, officials at the Navy Alcohol and Drug Abuse Prevention Branch Summit said Tuesday.
The Sasebo event continued through Wednesday and marked the first time the NADAP Branch staged a summit at the southernmost Japan naval facility.
The NADAP Branch’s mission is to support fleet readiness by reducing and preventing alcohol abuse and enforcing the Navy’s zero-tolerance policy for drugs, officials said at the summit in Sasebo’s Harbor View Club.
“You have to make your sailors understand that if they use drugs they will get caught and if they get caught they will get kicked out,” said Bill Flannery, NADAP Branch director, during the summit on Tuesday.
In addition, the organization processes administrative separation waivers for alcohol abuse and coordinates urinalysis testing and technical assistance for the Navy’s drug-screening program.
Flannery encouraged a strict get-tough and truly random testing approach when he warned, “If you provide an opportunity for these liars and predators (drug distributors,) they’ll use it.”
He said two main points were critical for commanders as they work to reduce alcohol- and drug-abuse incidents.
“When commanders make it clear they will invoke a consequence for any alcohol-related incident, you will see a decrease in alcohol abuse,” Flannery said. “For drugs, commanders need to educate sailors that random testing with direct observation (of sample collection) is in place and that with those guidelines, you cannot beat our program.”
The NADAP official noted that single-sailor programs and others that stress alternative activities to alcohol and drug use are important to decreasing the problem; such programs “appear to be working in Sasebo,” he added.
Drug use seems to vary by geographic region, Flannery said.
“You may find more methamphetamine on the West Coast and more cocaine and marijuana on the East Coast,” he said. “As far as servicemember populations and numbers, there is no real statistical variance between how much drug use takes place overseas compared to CONUS.”
Lt. Doug Searles, co-director of technical services at the Navy Drug Screening Laboratory, San Diego, the facility that analyzes all Navy and Marine Corps urinalysis samples west of the Mississippi River, described the threat of drug abuse as an insect infestation.
“If you have got one cockroach, you’ve got more cockroaches,” Searles said.
“We are here to help you get rid of drug pushers and drug users … we don’t want them in our Navy,” he told Sasebo-based commanders and command master chiefs on Tuesday. Various senior enlisted leaders attended Wednesday’s summit.
Most of the discussion Tuesday focused on drug use, criminal investigations, testing technology and related administrative and legal topics pertaining to the zero-tolerance policy.
Urinalysis expert Searles said tests producing positive results are not wrong if the sample is properly gathered.
On the Web:Navy Alcohol and Drug Abuse Prevention
Urinalysis testing
Urinalysis testing labs can detect the following drugs when specific blood-level thresholds are present within the specified drug detection windows:
THC (marijuana): 1-5 daysCocaine: 2-4 daysAmphetamines: 2 daysBarbiturates: 1-2 daysOpiates: 1-2 daysPCP: 5-7 daysLSD: 1-2 daysSteroids: 3 days or longerTHC detected after longer than 3 weeks indicates chronic or heavy use. Steroid detection can be requested by commanders and is determined by type and duration of use. In addition, abuse of prescription drugs can be tested upon request.
Source: U.S. Department of Defense and Navy
