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Launch HN: SannTek (YC S19) – Breathalyzer for Cannabis

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Re: Launch HN: SannTek (YC S19) – Breathalyzer for Cannabis

#281

Post by realshowbiz »

rbobby wrote: post #183
threezero wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please cite actual statistics and studies that prove cannabis impairment danger.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2722956/

“ In seven of ten studies cited, cannabis use was associated with a decrease in driving speed despite explicit instructions to maintain a particular speed, whereas under the influence of alcohol, subjects consistently drove faster. Two simulator studies showed that the tendency to overtake was decreased with cannabis use but increased with alcohol.52, 53 One simulator study and two on-road studies examining car-following behavior concluded that cannabis smokers tend to increase the distance between themselves and the car in front of them.41, 45 Other studies have found no adverse effects of marijuana use on sign detection,49 a sudden lane-changing task,43 or the detection of and response to hazardous events.”

Re: Launch HN: SannTek (YC S19) – Breathalyzer for Cannabis

#282

Post by neuralzen »

SannTek wrote: post #255
woah wrote: post #4

Sounds like it’s well-intentioned, but I’m afraid that given the incentives of all parties involved here, and the complexity of the technology, there will be a lot of false positives. It’s obvious that the police will want a device that produces more convictions, no point in disputing that. I’m wondering if you can elaborate on what incentives your company has to produce accurate devices, against your customer’s unst…

You raise a good point. Interestingly, your comments run contrary to what a lot of law enforcement officers have said to us. In general, the police are hyper vigilant about buying only devices that are independently validated to be very accurate. Every conversation we have had has eventually lead to "is it NHTSA approved?". The reason for this need for third party validation is that the police are incredibly court ro…

I admire what you're doing, and hope you can adhere to scientific integrity while developing and selling your product, but that simply isn't true. At least in Washington state. A few years ago Washington State purchased a whole bunch of Draeger 9510 (alcohol breathalyzer) units without ever having tested them. After two years of sitting unused, the warranties were going to expire and they finally got around to testing them, and purchasing extended warranties at that point. However their initial tests failed multiple accuracy tests to the point that the state's lab halted testing, since it was so off. A few months later Draeger patched the firmware and OS application (the breath/alcohol measurement firmware being written by a single contractor in Texas, and versioned as 0.7) and while testing looked better, it still wasn't accurate and they just pushed it out the door for deployment...they had already bought them, after all. I'll link the records below...they didn't even have the correct versions of the software and firmware accounted for and signed off, which led to other problems (and Draegar has had other problems of accuracy in other court cases, such as Florida, but that's a side tangent).

My point is, a lot of state governments (at least in the US) spend money first and verify later, and 'verify' can be a damnably loose term. Loose enough to violate WAC 448-15-020 (in Washington state's case) which requires a 'reasonable degree of scientific accuracy'.

EDIT: Apparently the original link (below) is no longer available in WSP's records, which is interesting. You can view the document via archive.org, here

https://web.archive.org/web/20170211114622/http://www.wsp.wa...

original (defunct) http://www.wsp.wa.gov/breathtest/docs/webdms/Draeger/Valid_D...

Re: Launch HN: SannTek (YC S19) – Breathalyzer for Cannabis

#283

Post by SannTek »

cik wrote: post #214

Can I ask why you went this way - and what the benefits are of your specific approach? With a friend having done this in the past - having sold his technology, I've been more than a little interested in this. Currently companies like Hound Labs have a breathalyzer test with high success rates (70% according to news reports). Israel (as a country) has two different spit tests that they've been using 'in production' (i…

Good question, especially regarding the DrugTest 5000

There are definitely some clear competitors in this space, but we feel that non of them have really been able to address the needs of the market.

Ill start with the Draeger because it is close to my heart. This is the device that has been approved in Canada for roadside screening. This was such a massive mistake. The government gave out tons of funding for police precincts to buy these so of course they did. However, they simply are not being used. I spoke with the drug recognition expert at the first ever police precinct in Canada to buy these devices. They bought two, and the day after the Captain of the precinct told him not to use them. He put them under his desk and they have been there ever since. The problem with the DrugTest 5000 is it is the size of a microwave, needs to be on a level surface, and has accuracy issues especially with cannabis. And really, police officers hate having to swabs someone's mouth for two minutes to get a sample.

With respect to other saliva tests, some are better than the Drager, some are worse, but they all have the same kind of problems. The police hate using them because swabbing peoples' mouths is gross, time consuming, and problematic in terms of chain of custody for evidence. Police use them because they are the best road side screening tests available today, but they would drop them in a heart beat for something less invasive.

In terms of Hound Labs, we are not 100% sure what to think. We understand they have been around for much longer, but they have not been deployed in any police precincts in the US. I know they did some early pilots in California, but nothing seems to have come of them. In general, our main advantage over Hound Labs is cost and durability. Electrochemical immunosensors are very cheap and really robust. The same can generally not be said for the fluorescent approach being used by Hound Labs. In the end, we will see who can provide the best product for the police, but we are fairly confident we have the edge.

Re: Launch HN: SannTek (YC S19) – Breathalyzer for Cannabis

#284

Post by root_axis »

davidw wrote: post #252
root_axis wrote: post #244

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I prefer to err on the side of data before it is mandated that people be tested for marijuana at traffic stops in the name of "caution".

Makes sense to follow similar protocols to alcohol: https://www.oregonlive.com/politics/2015/07/marijuana_and_dr... In other words, this isn't something that anyone who gets stopped goes through. You get tested if you're driving erratically. Driving is a privilege. It's easy enough to avoid doing it while high.

> Makes sense to follow similar protocols to alcohol

Only insomuch as those techniques have nothing to do with alcohol specifically and can be applied to any situation, including sleepy drivers.

> In other words, this isn't something that anyone who gets stopped goes through. You get tested if you're driving erratically.

Not true. You could be pulled over for a variety of reasons, anything from speeding to a broken tail-light or just because the cop thinks you look like a stoner and is betting he'll be able to bust you. From the article you linked:

> The officer evaluates the driver. Some signs are obvious: bloodshot eyes, candy bar wrappers and what Iwai calls the "typical Beavis and Butthead laugh." Others are more subtle -- for example, slightly protruding veins on the person's neck.

So the officer makes some subjective judgements that will allow him to administer the test and whether it comes back positive or negative, we have not established that the driver was actually impaired and this is critical because the test would then allow the officer to imprison the citizen even if they were not driving erratically. The suggestion that you'll only be pulled over for driving erratically is not true.

Re: Launch HN: SannTek (YC S19) – Breathalyzer for Cannabis

#285

Post by SannTek »

neuralzen wrote: post #282
SannTek wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You raise a good point. Interestingly, your comments run contrary to what a lot of law enforcement officers have said to us. In general, the police are hyper vigilant about buying only devices that are independently validated to be very accurate. Every conversation we have had has eventually lead to "is it NHTSA approved?". The reason for this need for third party validation is that the police are incredibly court ro…

I admire what you're doing, and hope you can adhere to scientific integrity while developing and selling your product, but that simply isn't true. At least in Washington state. A few years ago Washington State purchased a whole bunch of Draeger 9510 (alcohol breathalyzer) units without ever having tested them. After two years of sitting unused, the warranties were going to expire and they finally got around to testin…

Thanks for the info. Definitely something we have not run into or considered yet. I guess we just naively assumed that all police precincts were as scrupulous as those we talked to :(.

There is some stuff we can do, however. For instance, we can directly build the QC schedule into the device so it does not work unless you get it calibrated. We can also have QC cartridges that have a barcode that the device reads to make sure you actually ran a calibration check properly and the device passed.

We were so focused on internal methods for making the device accurate, but maybe we should put some thought into how we can make sure the police use it properly.

Re: Launch HN: SannTek (YC S19) – Breathalyzer for Cannabis

#286

Post by davinic »

beefman wrote: post #102
rudedogg wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This would actually be an easy technical solution, if laws could be passed to allow it. Basically a driving simulator with a handful of reasonable surprises. If you avoid them you’re declared not impaired.

Any reasonable device of this kind would fail a nonzero perccentage of sober drivers and pass a nonzero percentage of intoxicated drivers. And not just because of noise -- some people drive worse sober than others do high. So don't hold your breath waiting for laws to allow it.

But if the whole point is road safety and fewer accidents then those sober drivers should fail.

Re: Launch HN: SannTek (YC S19) – Breathalyzer for Cannabis

#287

Post by vageli »

joshgachnang wrote: post #156
rlt wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I get that breathalyzers give you a nice simple, relatively objective number to point at, but shouldn't we be testing for actual impairment rather than the presence of chemicals which may or may not be an indicator of impairment?

The officer should still have discretion here to let someone go if they don't feel the person is impaired. But giving them a number means they can't use that discretion the opposite way, e.g. arresting someone because "they seem like they're driving high". I imagine that kind of discretion would disproportionately affect minorities, so I see this as a win.

> The officer should still have discretion here to let someone go if they don't feel the person is impaired. But giving them a number means they can't use that discretion the opposite way, e.g. arresting someone because "they seem like they're driving high". I imagine that kind of discretion would disproportionately affect minorities, so I see this as a win.

I can't imagine a situation where an officer would employ the use of a breathalyzer and we worry about discretion. The officer used their discretion to pull the motorist over. They used their discretion to perform a sobriety test. They used their discretion to employ a breathalyzer.

Point is, if the cop wanted to let you off there are numerous occasions to do so.

Re: Launch HN: SannTek (YC S19) – Breathalyzer for Cannabis

#288

Post by neuralzen »

SannTek wrote: post #285
neuralzen wrote: post #282

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I admire what you're doing, and hope you can adhere to scientific integrity while developing and selling your product, but that simply isn't true. At least in Washington state. A few years ago Washington State purchased a whole bunch of Draeger 9510 (alcohol breathalyzer) units without ever having tested them. After two years of sitting unused, the warranties were going to expire and they finally got around to testin…

Thanks for the info. Definitely something we have not run into or considered yet. I guess we just naively assumed that all police precincts were as scrupulous as those we talked to :(. There is some stuff we can do, however. For instance, we can directly build the QC schedule into the device so it does not work unless you get it calibrated. We can also have QC cartridges that have a barcode that the device reads to m…

Really, if you're producing something that is reliably accurate, I would expect that would be all anyone would expect, along with proper training, verified updates, and audited software/firmware, etc. In the case I cited above it was more an issue with the lack of accuracy of the product, and sloppy follow through from the vendor, with money and political pressure thrown at the problem - something which the police departments themselves likely have less influence on anyway.

Re: Launch HN: SannTek (YC S19) – Breathalyzer for Cannabis

#289

Post by NewsAware »

chadash wrote: post #215
wysifnwyg wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The basic functionality of a breathalyzer is to take a given volume of an exhale and measure the concentration of a given particle as an indicator of intoxication. So long as an individual's results are greater than or equal to 0.08 then it becomes an unacceptable risk and they are considered intoxicated. If this process is going to test in a similar way, there is no need to test specific doses or profiles because th…

I think maybe you misunderstood @wolco's point? I think what they are saying is that, for example, you might do all of your testing on college age males and find that it doesn't give any false positives for people who smoked yesterday but not today. But you still need to test it on 60 year old women to make sure it doesn't give false positives there. In other words, you need to test it for varying lengths of time and…

Additionally you need to test it doesn't trigger a positive when someone had a cinnamon flavored mint before. Or a citrus one. Or ate a mushroom sandwich. Or has diabetes..etc etc

Re: Launch HN: SannTek (YC S19) – Breathalyzer for Cannabis

#290

Post by reroute1 »

ryanmercer wrote: post #159
Fogest wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Weed is also in other forms like edibles too which are quite potent. I have seen many people who have smoked excessive amounts, or had way too many edibles. I have personally working in the event medical field dealt with countless people who are puking and unconscious due to weed. It definitely is not anywhere near as bad as other drugs impairment wise, but it definitely can be quite dangerous to drive on. And yes, b…

>Weed is also in other forms like edibles too which are quite potent. I have seen many people who have smoked excessive amounts, or had way too many edibles. I have personally working in the event medical field dealt with countless people who are puking and unconscious due to weed. Every now and then you also hear that a law enforcement officer got high and called 911 panicking, googling "cop calls 911 high" brings u…

I disagree wholeheartedly, but even if I agreed with you that doesn't mean that this breathalyzer is a good solution:

To the points about people passing out or cops calling 911 on themselves that speaks to the incredible variety of experience people have and what someone might experience their first time with edibles. It's not comparable to the effects smoking has on regular users, and not something anyone should be doing while driving, but how do you test for that with a Breathalyzer?

Fair points but I think this testing is only about smoking? That would seem to give even less reason to support this kind of testing since it misses the most egregious cases of edibles. I think anyone would agree that people in that kind of state are in no condition to drive, but again in my experience way outside of normal usage and not something I have ever seen. If the test took that into account alright, but it seems like these breathalyzer would be detecting a far lower threshold

Edit: "Theyre working on it" when it comes to edibles....

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