OFFICIALS have been rather busy at the headquarters of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) in Montreal these past few months. As next year鈥檚 Olympics in Athens heave into view, they have been racing to finalise what they hope will be the ultimate in anti-cheating weapons 鈥� the world鈥檚 first harmonised rules governing dope testing across all sports and countries.
It is no easy task. The regulations have to cover out-of-competition tests, exemptions for medicinal drugs, standards for labs to adhere to, and more. And to give the code clout a critical mass of sports organisations and governments has to be persuaded to sign up. Is it worth it?
On the face of it, the answer seems obvious. One globally recognised anti-doping code is surely better than a bewildering array of different ones. And isn鈥檛 it about time that the world鈥檚 sporting bodies stood shoulder to shoulder against the drug cheats? After all, it is just weeks since yet another world championship ended in scandal.
Advertisement
As a doctor who sees some of the damage that so-called performance-enhancing drugs can do, I鈥檇 be delighted if the new anti-doping code does work wonders. The use of drugs in sport betrays all that sport stands for. Yet 鈥� and this is where I part company with the mainstream 鈥� I believe the strenuous efforts of those Montreal officials will in the long run be wasted. They might even make the problem worse. Why? Because, like the existing rules, the new code is at root based on prohibition, not on a policy of harm-reduction, and because it ends up making moral rather than scientifically credible distinctions between different substances and practices.
Consider the list of banned substances at the heart of the new world rules. It includes some 50 stimulants, nearly 40 anabolic steroids, 20 beta-blockers, 14 diuretics and eight narcotics. Some, especially the steroids, certainly are performance enhancers, but many substances on the list are there purely on suspicion of offering unfair athletic benefits. Others, including methadone and heroin, would do just the opposite, while some substances that almost certainly can enhance performance, such as creatine monohydrate, are not listed at all.
To get on the list a substance has to satisfy two out of the following three criteria: taking it is harmful; it enhances performance; or it is 鈥渁gainst the spirit of sport鈥�. Tobacco escapes the banned list because, though harmful, it is deemed to be neither a performance enhancer nor against the spirit of sport 鈥� it gets just a single strike. Methadone, by contrast, is deemed to be both harmful and, unlike nicotine, against the spirit of sport.
You can see the problem. 鈥淪pirit of sport鈥� is not something that can be objectively measured. It is a slippery set of moral presumptions and values. There is only one reason athletes consume lots of creatine or, if they are rich enough, train at high altitude: to enhance performance. But are these activities against the spirit of sport? Apparently not. Moreover, while supplements of the banned substance erythropoietin (EPO) are deemed a no-no, sleeping in a decompression chamber to boost levels of the body鈥檚 own EPO is apparently fair and sporting.
Such arbitrariness would be more forgivable if it were clear this style of prohibition worked. But to date it may simply have conditioned athletes and their coaches to use drugs in more sophisticated ways. While urine tests can pick up traces of common minor stimulants, many comparatively potent and risky substances on the WADA banned list cannot yet be tested for. Insulin, growth hormone, and insulin-like growth factor would all escape detection. Until this changes, anti-doping measures will remain better at catching athletes who have inadvertently taken the wrong sort of decongestant than at catching the serious cheats.
The message all this gives out to youngsters is counterproductive. With each glamorous athlete who tests positive we perpetuate two myths: that these drugs actually work, and that to succeed you have to take them.
For the vast majority of competitors and youngsters, these substances won鈥檛 work, and may cause harm. That鈥檚 the message we need to get across. We have to establish the facts about the effects of these substances on athletic performance and health, and combat the blinkered win-at-all-costs mentality that is the root cause of drug-taking in sport. Rather than concoct more anti-doping charters, and perpetuate moralising and phoney distinctions between different types of aids and practices, we should concentrate on building the credibility and trust required to minimise the harm. Draconian prohibition drives the entire issue underground, making young athletes who may have started dabbling in drugs reluctant to seek advice or help, and doctors reluctant to offer it.
The war to rid sport of drug-taking is well worth fighting. But let鈥檚 remember that the most effective way to win a war is not by force but through hearts and minds.