The United States Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) has issued a response to a statement from the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), which accused the American side of using the practice of covering up athletes arrested for doping in exchange for information.
“It is sad to see WADA leadership’s desperate and dangerous attempts to smear others, including whistleblowers, rather than answering fundamental questions about why they allowed China to cover up 23 positive tests for trimetazidine and 2 positive tests for methandienone.” Now, as athletes around the world speak out against this situation and how it affected swimming competitions at the Paris Olympics, WADA is responding by attacking others. Clean athletes deserve better from WADA. For Olympic values to have meaning, it is time to get WADA right.
Ironically, the thorough investigations by USADA and the international federation involved, mentioned in WADA’s statement, demonstrate exactly what WADA should have done with the Chinese swimmers’ positive tests: gather evidence to establish the truth and follow the rules to protect clean sport.
WADA was aware of the cooperation with the athletes, including their return to competition. This was necessary for an FBI and Drug Enforcement Administration investigation into a human trafficking and controlled substance trafficking scheme.
WADA was informed of the violations and sanctions and did not appeal, even though it had the right to do so. The Code allows for substantial relief such as that provided in this case. And WADA did not initiate compliance proceedings against USADA, as it should have done if it truly believed we were not complying with the rules.
“We feel sorry for clean athletes: WADA’s current leadership seems more interested in their own reputations than in protecting the cleanliness of sport,” USADA CEO Travis Tigert said in a statement.
In July, it was announced that WADA would review USADA’s compliance with the International Anti-Doping Code in August, potentially calling into question whether the Olympics can be held in the United States.
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Source : MatchTV
I’m John White and I’m an experienced journalist working in the news industry. My specialty is covering sports news, which I’ve been doing for over 6 years now. During this time, I have worked as an author with Athletistic, a popular online news website focusing on sports topics.
