Aberdonian Stu
28/07/2005, 2:21 PM
The issue of drugs has come up in a number of recent threads. In particular the relevancy of whether or not someone has tested positive.
Any athlete playing in a sport that follows the WADA code (including all sports that are affilliated to the IOC, as well as the GAA and IRB) can fill out a therapeutic use exemption form(TUE). They fill outthe form to declare if they are taking any medication that would result in a positive test for a banned substance.
The system existed prior to WADA's inception and has been abused for years. For example a couple of years ago stats showed that 20 per cent of French sportspeople were diabetic.
In the case of Lance Armstrong his TUE makes it virtually impossible to either clear his name or be proven guilty. The reason being that his medication pretty much breaks all the major substance violations.
Note that this doesn't mean that an athlete is allowed take a whole load of steroids.
Drug tests are looking for substances that result from the intake of drugs, so they won't find pure THG in a sample but they can find the proof it was there.
Personally I'm immensely sceptical of Armstrong because it's hardly to believe any cyclist is clean anymore.
For more information go to: http://www.wada-ama.org/en/dynamic.ch2?pageCategory_id=98
Any athlete playing in a sport that follows the WADA code (including all sports that are affilliated to the IOC, as well as the GAA and IRB) can fill out a therapeutic use exemption form(TUE). They fill outthe form to declare if they are taking any medication that would result in a positive test for a banned substance.
The system existed prior to WADA's inception and has been abused for years. For example a couple of years ago stats showed that 20 per cent of French sportspeople were diabetic.
In the case of Lance Armstrong his TUE makes it virtually impossible to either clear his name or be proven guilty. The reason being that his medication pretty much breaks all the major substance violations.
Note that this doesn't mean that an athlete is allowed take a whole load of steroids.
Drug tests are looking for substances that result from the intake of drugs, so they won't find pure THG in a sample but they can find the proof it was there.
Personally I'm immensely sceptical of Armstrong because it's hardly to believe any cyclist is clean anymore.
For more information go to: http://www.wada-ama.org/en/dynamic.ch2?pageCategory_id=98