Besides the impairment approach to sanction driving under the influence, a zero limit tolerance, with administrative punishments has been introduced in several European countries. It will be interesting to observe the development of traffic safety among young male drivers in these countries and to compare it with other attempts. In the symposium, the different approaches, including epidemiology and profiles of drug action will be presented. WDT in Europe is somewhat different from the US as regards the drugs that are tested for, cut-offs used and the emphasis on a more preventive approach. Their usefulness for toxicologists can be lessened where the concentrations monitored do not extend fully into the toxic range or where the matrix is synthetic, of animal origin or serum as opposed to whole human blood.
Specialist schemes are available for drugs of abuse testing in urine and for hair analysis.
Whilst these programs provide much useful information on the performance of analytical techniques, they fail to monitor the integrated processes that are needed in toxicological case investigations. In practice, both qualitative and quantitative tests are used in combination with case information to guide the evaluation of the samples and to develop an interpretation of the analytical findings used to provide clinical or forensic advice.