Workers who smoke cigarettes are more expensive to employ. Why? Because smoking negatively affects the health of smokers which increases the cost of health care insurance—to the tune of $193 billion between 2000 and 2014. Consider that lost productivity accounted for $97 billion and health care expenditures accounted for $96 billion. Wow! No wonder employers are interested in hiring workers who do not smoke and the Affordable Care Act, commonly known as Obamacare, actually paves the way for employers to screen applicants and employees for Cotinine, a metabolite of Nicotine that proves that a person has been smoking.

Whether you are considering cotinine testing for employment or as part of a corporate wellness program, to screen job applicants or deter smoking as part of a cessation program you need to consider testing for cotinine.