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Old 07-21-2007, 10:12 PM
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Default Careful with cold drugs and Listerine.

Watch what you take and don't get a DUI. Just read about a UPS driver who got a DUI while driving his own car. Wasn't fire but had to do random checks. Company made a check one morning and caught him with a blood alcohol rate of .03. He had been drinking the night before and used listerine in the morning. I never realized listerine could make you show a high blood alcohol rate. Also, you can still show residual blood alcohol after a nights sleep. Read more at:

http://www.browncafe.com/forum/ups_d...p_trouble.html


Listerine 'Martini?'
Facts vs. fiction about drunk driving.
By Jeff McConnell and James Mennella, Attorneys At Law



Don't laugh just yet. We've had a lot of drivers over the years call in from a pay phone, crying, wondering why they've just been issued a DUI (Driving Under the Influence) ticket even though they don't drink alcohol. What happened? How can you get a ticket for DUI when you don't drink?

This article tells you about a very serious problem that can end your career as a commercial driver: a DUI conviction involving your truck or your personal vehicle. Take a close look at the items you've got in your truck right now. What's in your suitcase? Mouthwash, cold medicine, allergy pills, prescription drugs? Did you know that most mouthwashes contain alcohol? That some cough and cold medicines contain huge doses of alcohol? How long does alcohol stay in your system? How much alcohol do you have to have before you can (legally) get a ticket for DUI?

We hope the following information will help answer these questions. Here's the truth.



Question: About a week ago, I woke up feeling like I was coming down with the flu so I took some liquid cough and cold medicine to see if I could beat this one. About an hour later, I pulled into a scale house and the officer asked me to take breathalyzer test. I told him that I didn't drink and took the test anyway. The breathalyzer read .045 and the officer gave me a DUI ticket! What now?

Answer: The good news is you didn't refuse to take the breathalyzer test. Never refuse to take a breathalyzer. Refusing a breathalyzer test is an automatic suspension of your CDL. The bad news is you're holding a DUI ticket with your name on it and now you're "in the system." So here you are. You've just got a DUI ticket. Your license to drive (at least in the state where you got the ticket) is now suspended. You have to get an attorney. You have to schedule a hearing at the local DMV. You have to plead "not guilty" at the local court. You have to stay up nights worrying about being convicted and losing your CDL for at least a year.

All of this could have been avoided if you had taken a few minutes to go through your duffel bag, read your labels and thrown away anything with large amounts of alcohol in it. Get it out of the truck. The legal limit for commercial DUI is .04. That's not hard to get to, especially when you're using a mouthwash that's over 20% alcohol.



Question: I had been out the night before for dinner and drinking with some friends. I got a good night's sleep, got up early the next morning and was asked to take a breathalyzer when I stopped at the port of entry. I blew a .04 and got a DUI ticket. Why was my BAC (blood alcohol content) still so high?

Answer: "Residual Alcohol." This is the number-one problem we see. Residual or "left over" alcohol in your system will get you out of the truck faster than anything we know. If you're going to drink, remember that it takes your body a certain amount of time to process and get rid of alcohol. Depending on when you stopped drinking and your particular body, it's possible to still have a BAC hours later that could end up in a DUI charge.



Question: A friend told me that if an officer asks me to take a breathalyzer test I should refuse it so there's no evidence to use against me later. Should I refuse?

Answer: No. don't refuse a breathalyzer test. If you refuse a breathalyzer test, your license will automatically be suspended even if you're found "not guilty" at trial. Also, when you refuse a breathalyzer, your attorney is going to have an even harder time convincing the prosecuting attorney to agree to a plea bargain. Don't tie your attorney's hands before he/she gets started. Take the breathalyzer.



Question: I got a DUI in my personal car and my company terminated my lease. Why does my company care what I do on my time off?

Answer: What you have to remember is that you only have one MVR and any tickets, whether in your personal car or commercial truck, will show up on a single record. Your MVR determines what insurance rates you get. Bad MVR = Bad Rates. If your company is carrying your liability insurance, they'll want your MVR as clean as possible so their rates remain reasonable.



We hope you can use the information in this column to help with everyday, real life problems you face on the road. We invite you to send us any questions or comments you may have regarding transportation law to ROAD LAW, 1330 N. Classen Blvd., Suite 215, Oklahoma City, OK 73106; fax to (405) 272-0558 or contact us through our website at www.roadlaw.net. We look forward to hearing from you.
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Old 07-21-2007, 11:18 PM
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A person needs to be careful what they take for colds and other products they use that contain alcohol.

Many couch syrups and several brands of liquid cold medicines have an alcohol base to them, and if you take enough can cause you to fail a brethalizer test. Also as mentioned above, some brands of mouthwash have a high content as well.

Quote:

Question: I got a DUI in my personal car and my company terminated my lease. Why does my company care what I do on my time off?

Answer: What you have to remember is that you only have one MVR and any tickets, whether in your personal car or commercial truck, will show up on a single record. Your MVR determines what insurance rates you get. Bad MVR = Bad Rates. If your company is carrying your liability insurance, they'll want your MVR as clean as possible so their rates remain reasonable.
This is only a partial answer. More to the point, how can a company know for certain that you will not drink and drive in a CMV if you have proven that you will do it another type of vehicle. If you have a recent conviction for DUI and the company continues to allow you to work for them they are facing a huge liability issue should you get into an accident.
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Old 07-22-2007, 04:53 AM
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I'm curious as to why a breathalyzer or blood test would even be issued for someone who hadn't been drinking "real" alcohol. In the scale house example, do you know if the DOT man smelled something on his breath or was it completely random. Guess I didn't realize they did that sort of thing.
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Old 07-22-2007, 05:12 AM
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I can understand things like cough syrup staying with you for awhile causing you to fail a breathalyzer, but Mouthwash? Being that most people don't swallow things like listerine, would it still show up on a breath test or even a blood test?

I can see an officer getting a positive breathalyzer test right after using the mouthwash, but how long would it actually stick with you? just wondering because I have used listerine in the past, but if it's going to get me busted for DUI I'll use something else :shock:
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Old 07-22-2007, 05:54 AM
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That's what I thought. No more listerine or any other product that has alcohol in it.
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Old 07-22-2007, 09:48 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by CaliTrucker
I can understand things like cough syrup staying with you for awhile causing you to fail a breathalyzer, but Mouthwash? Being that most people don't swallow things like listerine, would it still show up on a breath test or even a blood test?

I can see an officer getting a positive breathalyzer test right after using the mouthwash, but how long would it actually stick with you? just wondering because I have used listerine in the past, but if it's going to get me busted for DUI I'll use something else :shock:
I knew a Guy back in the 70's-early 80's, who would drink his booze with a spoon. Reason he did it that way, was to get the "drunk effect" faster, and to do it on the cheap. He didn't make a lot of money and loved being tanked.

Now...How does "drinking with a spoon" get you drunk faster? Your tounge absorbs 75% of the alcohol. So...You grab up that bottle of Listerine in the morning, pull off the cap and take a nice big swig, straight out of the bottle...work it back and forth for 45 seconds or so....presto chango...you have a high BAC. Get into a "Chicken Coop" first thing...and what does a smart cop smell? Doesn't matter if the cop knows it's only mouth wash...what Officer Intelligent knows...it's a "ticketable" offense...and he just popped you.
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Old 07-22-2007, 12:29 PM
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sometimes i drink overnight and wake up feeling drunk but maybe thats just a hangover? ops:
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Old 07-22-2007, 03:46 PM
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Quote:
Now...How does "drinking with a spoon" get you drunk faster? Your tounge absorbs 75% of the alcohol. So...You grab up that bottle of Listerine in the morning, pull off the cap and take a nice big swig, straight out of the bottle...work it back and forth for 45 seconds or so....presto chango...you have a high BAC. Get into a "Chicken Coop" first thing...and what does a smart cop smell? Doesn't matter if the cop knows it's only mouth wash...what Officer Intelligent knows...it's a "ticketable" offense...and he just popped you.
That makes sense...I didn't know about the tongue absorbing most of the alcohol. I guess I definitely need to pay more attention when I get another bottle of mouthwash :shock:
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Old 07-22-2007, 06:05 PM
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I found this on Listerine....of course bear in mind this is the internet and the article is not a scientific peer reviewed article.

Quote:
Dear cecil, can you actually get drunk on mouthwash, vanilla extract etc etc. thanx dude --

Cecil replies:

Listerine abuse has got to be the stupidest form of private amusement since . . . well, I was about to say since biblical knowledge of the Hoover Dustette (see penis, surgical repair of wounds to), but on reflection I have to say intravenous lettuce injection, recently discussed in this space, is also up there. Anyway, to answer your collective questions briefly, no, denaturing of alcohol, special or otherwise, does not render it incapable of causing intoxication, and yes, you can get pretty hammered if you drink enough, although why anyone of legal drinking age would want to do so is a question that defies linear thought.

Many mouthwashes contain alcohol--original formula Listerine is 26.9 percent alcohol, making it approximately 54 proof (other flavors contain less). Denatured makes it sound like they take out of alcohol whatever's normally in it that gets you drunk, but in fact all they do is put other stuff in to make it undrinkable (except by the truly desperate) and in some cases poisonous. Why denature, you ask? Because the potable natural version is subject to federal excise tax, whereas the denatured kind isn't. "Completely denatured alcohol" is virtually impossible to render into a drinkable beverage--it may contain kerosene, among other things. "Specially denatured alcohol" such as that used in Listerine receives less radical treatment, although some SDA formulas do contain methyl (wood) alcohol, which if ingested often or copiously enough can cause blindness, organ damage, and death.

Listerine presumably is free of such toxins (which is not to say it's entirely safe, a matter we'll return to), though its manufacturer, Pfizer, declined to confirm exactly what form of SDA it does contain. However, my consultant Bibliophage, a resourceful fellow, deduces that Pfizer uses SDA formula 38-B as defined in the Code of Federal Regulations, since said formula is the only one listed that may include eucalyptol, menthol, methyl salicylate, and thymol, all of which are named as active ingredients on the Listerine label. Impress your buddies in the Dumpster with that.

Which brings up another issue: Why would anybody drink this stuff when a couple bucks will get you a bottle of Thunderbird or Wild Irish Rose and let you vaporize brain cells in style? The only remotely plausible explanations I've heard are that (a) while the clerks keep a close eye on the booze aisle, boosting Listerine is, comparatively speaking, cake; (b) some states restrict alcohol sales on Sundays or at other specified times; and (c) mouthwash is easier to sneak into the shelter, hospital, etc. Evidence on the last point comes to us from the Journal of Emergency Medicine, which tells of a 55-year-old woman treated in the ER for acute alcohol intoxication. Puzzled that her blood ethanol level remained high, medical personnel established that when searched she'd been allowed to keep a bottle of Listerine on the grounds that it was a personal hygiene product. This she had been surreptitiously imbibing. ER medics have a term for the alcohol contained in such unorthodox inebriants: NBE, or nonbeverage ethanol. Besides mouthwash, NBE sources include hair spray, cosmetics, some cough and cold remedies (e.g. NyQuil), aftershave and other personal care products, and, yes, vanilla extract.

Whatever gets you through the night. But let's be practical. First, while mouthwash is perhaps less apt to corrode your internal organs than, say, brake fluid (or paint thinner, or shoe polish dripped through stale bread), carrot juice it ain't. Turning to the journals again, we read of one fellow who died after drinking three liters of Listerine; if mouthwash is quaffed in keg-size quantities, the authors conclude, the "phenolic compounds" it contains (eucalyptol, menthol, and thymol) "may contribute to a severe anion-gap metabolic acidosis and osmolar gap, multiorgan system failure, and death." Still on the fence? I found some no-name, plastic-bottle, one-notch-above-Prestone 80-proof vodka on sale at the supermarket for $9.99 per 1.75 liters, or 1.4 cents per milliliter of alcohol. A one-liter bottle of Listerine original can be had for $5.19, or 1.9 cents per milliliter of alcohol. So, Dwayne, if you're chugging mouthwash thinking, OK, it's not Remy Martin, but at least I'm saving money for grad school--sorry, dude, think again.

--CECIL ADAMS
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Old 07-22-2007, 09:15 PM
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doesnt chewing gum now have alcohol? wtf! :shock:
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