Emily nearly lost access to her baby because of a hair strand test. Experts fear she's not alone

Here is the latest breaking news from around the world: Emily nearly lost access to her baby because of a hair strand test. Experts fear she's not alone14 minutes ago Share Save Add as preferred on GoogleSanchia Berg ,Anna MeiselandMary O'ReillyGetty ImagesFile photo showing strands of hair which can be used for drug testingWhen social workers asked a mother to submit a sample of hair for a drugs test, she thought it would prove she was clean and sober. But it turned out to be the start of a legal battle to regain custody of her daughter.

Emily - not her real name - was a former ketamine user, whose habit had resulted in her baby daughter being taken into care at the end of 2022. In the six months since then, she had made a determined effort to put her substance abuse behind her. With the help of a drugs charity, Emily had attended courses and taken urine tests about twice a week to prove that she was no longer using.

The Details

However, the result of the hair strand test came as a complete shock. It stated that high levels of ketamine had been recorded, and there was evidence of active drug use over the six months up to June 2023. As a result, the court refused Emily's request to be reunited with her daughter.

Hair strand tests are widely used in Family Court cases where parents are suspected of - or have a history of - drug or alcohol abuse. They can help judges make life-changing decisions, deciding whether it is safe for children to live with their parents. The science of hair strand testing is sound, but there are growing concerns over the way tests are presented and interpreted.

Results can be affected by hair type, by the use of hair treatments or dyes, and by more individual factors, like the rate of hair growth and the environment you are living in. Critics say the test reports don't fully consider these factors. For many years, reporting a case like Emily's was almost impossible, because of privacy rules governing Family Court proceedings.

What Experts Say

However, the Family Court has recently opened up its workings to journalists, and the has been able to obtain a High Court order to tell her story. "It absolutely blew me away," Emily says about the hair strand test, "because I hadn't touched at all. "She believed the traces of ketamine dated back to 2022, when she had still been a user.

The test report said the results demonstrated "active use of ketamine" since Emily's daughter had been taken into care. But more ambiguously, it said it could neither "confirm nor refute" that Emily had stopped using the drug. Emily was not prepared to give up, and she volunteered to do six more hair tests as she fought for her daughter.

Hair strand tests for drugs and alcohol have become central to Family Court proceedings, and are carried out by government-approved commercial laboratories. They work on the principle that when a drug passes into the bloodstream, it leaves traces within a person's hair. As the hair grows, it retains the traces and also provides a timeline of when the drug was taken.

The story has become one of the most prominent items on the global agenda.