Stand up for medical “amnesty”

A recent push from the Office of Student Conduct threatens to dismantle the medical “amnesty” students receive when they seek Emergency Medical Services for alcohol-related incidents. As every first-year student learns, if you call Duke EMS on a Thursday night for overconsumption, you won’t face disciplinary action in the morning. This policy of “amnesty” exists so that students never hesitate to seek medical attention for themselves or their friends. But if a new judicial policy is pushed through, the notion of amnesty will be a half-truth. You won’t be disciplined for the alcohol violation—unless you do it again.

Don’t worry, the proposal pitched to the Office of Student Conduct Advisory Group won’t put a two-strike limit on medical amnesty. But it will document every amnesty given for EMS calls and allow the Undergraduate Conduct Board to consider that record in determining the sanctions issued to convicted students. That means that if you receive amnesty for an EMS call in your first year, that incident could be used to prove a history of alcohol violations if you end up in trouble for an alcohol-related incident two years later. UCB members will consider your amnesty record when they decide whether you should see counseling, be suspended or even expelled.

The rationale behind the proposal is that it will help the UCB identify students with serious alcohol problems who have gone under the radar. To be sure, a frightening number of Duke students suffer from alcoholism, and Duke should be proactive in identifying at-risk members of the community. But there are measures in place right now to do this, and the disciplinary process is not the place to assess vulnerability. As things stand, when students get EMS treatment, they aren’t disciplined, but they do participate in follow-up conversations with judicial advisors and can be flagged for more serious therapy.

It’s safe to assume that if a student is dangerously intoxicated, his or her friends will call EMS regardless of the disciplinary implications. But imagine a first-year student who sees a friend visibly intoxicated. The friend insists he’s okay, but the student knows that there’s nothing to be lost by calling Duke EMS, so he plays it safe and his friend gets basic medical treatment.

Now imagine a world under the Office of Student Conduct’s proposed policy. The student sees his friend but knows that if he calls for even minor intoxication, the incident will follow his friend throughout his Duke career. Sure, his future law school won’t hear about it—unless he gets cited for playing drinking games on campus two years later and the amnesty record puts the UCB’s decision over the edge. Suddenly what might have been settled through admonition could potentially result in suspension. I have faith in the UCB’s good judgment when it comes to decisions like this, but the student at least knows that the potential is there. Would he still call EMS for his friend? Would you?

For amnesty to serve its purpose it must be held sacred. Students need to trust that there won’t be consequences for calling EMS—not in the moment, not in the morning and not in two years. We must help students help themselves by never giving them a reason to hesitate calling. When it comes to students seeking emergency medical treatment, amnesty means amnesty.

Mike Lefevre is a Trinity senior and former president of Duke Student Government.