{"id":584642,"date":"2024-04-22T14:26:37","date_gmt":"2024-04-22T21:26:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.swimmingworldmagazine.com\/news\/?p=584642"},"modified":"2024-04-22T14:38:31","modified_gmt":"2024-04-22T21:38:31","slug":"wada-says-athletes-should-not-have-concerns-over-chinese-doping-case","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.swimmingworldmagazine.com\/news\/wada-says-athletes-should-not-have-concerns-over-chinese-doping-case\/","title":{"rendered":"WADA Says \u2018Athletes Should Not Have Concerns\u2019 Over Chinese Doping Case"},"content":{"rendered":"

WADA Says \u2018Athletes Should Not Have Concerns\u2019 Over Chinese Doping Case<\/strong><\/p>\n

In a nearly two-hour press availability Monday, officials from the World Anti-Doping Agency endorsed its handling of doping positives within the Chinese program in 2021 as evidence of its protection of athletes.<\/p>\n

The case stemmed from reporting by the New York Times,<\/strong> Australia\u2019s Daily Telegraph<\/strong> and the German broadcaster ARD that 23 Chinese swimmers had tested positive for Trimetazidine in January 2021. An investigation by the Chinese Anti-Doping Agency (CHINADA) found in April 2021 that the cause was contamination of a hotel kitchen, which WADA found no ground to dispute in its review of the case in June and July. No bans were handed out, no results were erased and the Chinese athletes were allowed to compete at the Tokyo Olympics in 2021, with both organizations and World Aquatics accepting that no anti-doping rules violations occurred.<\/p>\n

That conclusion, to WADA officials, amounted to the systems working correctly. When asked several times Monday about the message that decision sent to other swimmers, WADA officials stressed that its burden was to protect Chinese athletes \u2013 both their privacy and their ability to compete \u2013 after being innocent of knowingly ingesting illegal substances. That was paramount over disclosing to other athletes about a positive test.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is an explanation that WADA and not only WADA but World Aquatics scrutinized extremely clearly,\u201d WADA general counsel Ross Wenzel<\/strong> said. \u201cThis will be clear from what Professor (Olivier<\/strong>) Rabin<\/strong> (WADA\u2019s Senior Director of Science and Medicine) has said and what I\u2019ve said, based on a number of contextual elements, factual elements but also on the science, we concluded that this was a case of innocent exposure. And that is our genuine conclusion with respect to what happened here based on the evidence that we have been and still have now.<\/p>\n

\u201cTherefore, athletes from other countries that are competing against these athletes should not have concerns. These were athletes that, we have to assume, were innocently exposed to Trimetazidine contamination.\u201d<\/p>\n

That was Wenzel\u2019s answer when provided a variety of scenarios, including the notion that other athletes have been provisionally suspended for positive tests and missed out on international events even when having later been exonerated of doping. (WADA\u2019s response on the issue of provisional suspensions, as well as on disclosure of the tests without a doping rule-violation having occurred, was that such actions are under the purview of the investigative body, i.e. CHINADA.)<\/p>\n

Director General Olivier Niggli<\/strong> went even further. Taking the CHINADA investigation for its merits and WADA having agreed with the key portions of it, he says, is evidence that Chinese swimmers are innocent of doping. As such, provisional suspensions or prejudices against them would have effectively victimized them for reasons beyond their control.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it\u2019s extremely important to make the distinction here,\u201d Niggli said. \u201cThe questions that were asked infer that we\u2019re dealing with cheaters who may have been allowed to compete. This is not what we\u2019re talking about. We\u2019re talking about just the opposite, which is the system having protected a number of innocent athletes from behind taken out of sport, and I think you\u2019re all going to have to reflect on the fact that we have a very tough system in anti-doping. There\u2019s a lot of burden on the athletes, but we\u2019re also receiving regular calls, including from the U.S. a lot, and the fact is that we have to protect innocent athletes.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s an example where, based on the evidence that are available \u2013 which you may or may not believe, but that\u2019s the only ones that are there \u2013 the system has a role to protect a number of innocent athletes from being kept out of the (sport). The system works both ways, and that\u2019s what has to be remembered.\u201d<\/p>\n

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