Agence mondial antidopage | |
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Abbreviation | WADA |
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Formation | 10 November 1999 |
Type | Non-profit |
Purpose | Anti-doping in sport |
Headquarters | Montreal, Quebec, Canada |
Coordinates | 45°30′03″N73°33′43″W / 45.50083°N 73.56194°W |
Official languages | |
President | Witold Bańka |
Affiliations | International Olympic Committee |
Website | wada-ama |
Part of a series on |
Doping in sport |
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The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA; French : Agence mondiale antidopage, AMA) is a foundation initiated by the International Olympic Committee based in Canada to promote, coordinate, and monitor the fight against drugs in sports. The agency's key activities include scientific research, education, development of anti-doping capacities, and monitoring of the World Anti-Doping Code, whose provisions are enforced by the UNESCO International Convention Against Doping in Sport. The aims of the Council of Europe Anti-Doping Convention and the United States Anti-Doping Agency are also closely aligned with those of WADA.
WADA is responsible for the World Anti-Doping Code, adopted by more than 650 sports organisations, including international sports federations, national anti-doping organisations, the IOC, and the International Paralympic Committee.
The World Anti-Doping Agency is a foundation created through a collective initiative led by the International Olympic Committee (IOC). It was set up on 10 November 1999 in Lausanne, Switzerland, nearly a year after meetings [1] that resulted in what was called the "Declaration of Lausanne", [2] to promote, coordinate and monitor the fight against drugs in sports. Since 2002, the organisation's headquarters have been located in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The Lausanne office became the regional office for Europe. Other regional offices have been established in Africa, Asia/Oceania and Latin America. WADA is responsible for the World Anti-Doping Code, adopted by more than 650 sports organisations, including international sports federations, national anti-doping organisations, the IOC, and the International Paralympic Committee. As of 2020 [update] , its president is Witold Banka. [3]
Initially funded by the International Olympic Committee, [4] WADA receives half of its budgetary requirements from them, with the other half coming from various national governments. Its governing bodies are also composed in equal parts by representatives from the sporting movement (including athletes) and governments of the world. The Agency's key activities include scientific research, education, development of anti-doping capacities, and monitoring of the World Anti-Doping Code.[ citation needed ]
In 2016, academic Richard McLaren, an independent investigator working on behalf of WADA, published a second part of his report (the first having been published in July 2016) showing that more than 1,000 Russian athletes in over 30 sports had been involved in or benefited from state-sponsored doping from 2011 to 2015. [5] [6] [7] [8] As a result of the report, many Russian athletes were barred from participating in the 2018 Winter Olympics. [9] Despite widely accepted evidence, in 2018 WADA lifted its ban on Russian athletes. [10] The reinstatement was strongly criticised by, among others, Russian whistleblower Grigory Rodchenkov, [11] and his lawyer, James Walden. [12]
WADA is an international organisation. It delegates work in individual countries to Regional and National Anti-Doping Organisations (RADOs and NADOs) and mandates that these organisations are compliant with the World Anti-Doping Code. [13] [14] WADA also accredits around 30 laboratories to perform the required scientific analysis for doping control. [15]
The statutes of WADA and the World Anti-Doping Code mandate the Court of Arbitration for Sport's ultimate jurisdiction in deciding doping-related cases. [16]
The highest decision-making authority in WADA is the 38-member Foundation Board, which is comprised equally of IOC representatives and representatives of national governments. [17] The Foundation Board appoints the agency's president. [18] Most day-to-day management is delegated to the executive committee. [17]
The executive committee, comprising 16 members, is delegated the Foundation Board to manage the day-to-day operations of the WADA. They are also responsible for all decisions not reserved by WADA's Statutes to the Board. Representatives are appointed by the IOC and governments. Many are current or former athletes. As of April 2024 [update] Witold Bańka is president, and Yang Yang is vice-president of the committee. [19]
Nr | Dates | Name | Country of origin |
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1 | 10 November 1999 – 31 December 2007 | Dick Pound | ![]() |
2 | 1 January 2008 – 31 December 2013 | John Fahey | ![]() |
3 | 1 January 2014 – 31 December 2019 | Craig Reedie | ![]() |
4 | 1 January 2020 – present | Witold Bańka | ![]() |
The Nominations Committee was created in September 2019 in order to ensure that the right people are recruited to serve in senior governance roles within the organisation. Independent Australian business executive Diane Smith-Gander was appointed as inaugural chair of the committee. Other independent members appointed are German human resources expert Regine Buettner and British business executive Simon Gillham. The sports movement nominee is Kelly Fairweather from South Africa, and Maja Makovec Brenčič of Slovenia is the public authority (government) nominee. [20]
There also exist several sub-committees with narrower remits, including a Finance and Administration Committee [21] and an Athlete Committee peopled by athletes. [22]
![]() | This section needs expansionwith: discussion of the significant topic of strict liability. You can help by adding to it. (March 2022) |
The World Anti-Doping Code is a document published by WADA that approximately 700 sports organisations across the world are signatories to. [23] The code "harmonizes anti-doping policies, rules, and regulations within sport organisations and among public authorities" for the purpose of "protect[ing] the athletes' fundamental right to participate in doping-free sport". [23] [24] The code is supplemented by eight international standards published by WADA covering the topics of prohibited substances, testing and investigations, laboratories, Therapeutic Use Exemptions, protection of privacy and personal information, code compliance by signatories, education, and results management. [25] The most recent version of the code took effect on 1 January 2021. [24] [26]
In 2004, the World Anti-Doping Code was implemented by sports organisations prior to the Olympic Games in Athens, Greece. In November 2007, more than 600 sports organisations (international sports federations, national anti-doping organisations, the International Olympic Committee, the International Paralympic Committee, and a number of professional leagues in various countries of the world) unanimously adopted a revised Code at the Third World Conference on Doping in Sport, to take effect on 1 January 2009. [27]
In 2013, further amendments to the Code were approved, doubling the sanction for a first offence where intentional doping is established, but allowing for more lenient sanctions for inadvertent rule violations or for athletes co-operating with anti-doping agencies. The updated code came into effect on 1 January 2015. [28] [29]
On 16 November 2017, WADA's Foundation Board initiated the 2021 Code Review Process, which also involved simultaneous review of the International Standards. During this time, stakeholders had multiple opportunities to contribute and make recommendations on how to further strengthen the global anti-doping program. Following the review process, stakeholders were invited to intervene publicly on the proposed Code and Standards during the Agency's Fifth World Conference on Doping in Sport in Katowice, Poland – an opportunity which was taken up by over 70 stakeholder organisations – before the Code and the full suite of Standards were approved by the Foundation Board and executive committee respectively.
The anti-doping code revised the whereabouts system in place since 2004, under which, as of 2014 [update] , athletes are required to select one hour per day, seven days a week to be available for no-notice drugs tests. [30]
This was unsuccessfully challenged at law in 2009 by Sporta, the Belgian sports union, arguing that the system violated article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights; [31] and by FIFPro, the international umbrella group of football players' unions, basing its case on data protection and employment law. [31]
A significant number of sports organisations, governments, athletes, and other individuals and organisations have expressed support for the "whereabouts" requirements. The International Association of Athletics Federations [32] and UK Sport [33] are two of the most vocal supporters of this rule. Both FIFA and UEFA have criticised the system, citing privacy concerns,[ citation needed ] as has the BCCI. [34]
WADA has published a Q&A explaining the rationale for the change. [35]
Professor Donald A. Berry has argued that the closed systems used by anti-doping agencies do not allow statistical validation of the tests. [36] This argument was seconded by an accompanying editorial in the journal Nature (7 August 2008). [37] The anti-doping community and scientists familiar with anti-doping work rejected these arguments. On 30 October 2008, Nature (Vol 455) published a letter to the editor from WADA countering Berry's article. [38] There has been at least one case where the development of statistical decision limit used by WADA in HGH use testing was found invalid by the Court of Arbitration for Sport. [39]
In 2018, the exterior case containing samples from an anti-doping test, but not the vials themselves, was smashed by the security guards of Chinese swimmer Sun Yang. In justification, the Doping Control Assistant (DCA) in charge of the testing mission was later criticised by Sun Yang, Chinese media, journalists, and scholars for not following the proper protocols. [40] Sun argued the DCA in question lacked proper identification, a situation that he said had happened previously with the same assistant. [41] [40] FINA's Doping Panel issued Sun with a warning but imposed no penalty. WADA appealed the FINA decision to the Court of Arbitration for Sport. [42]
The Sunday Times reported on January 27, 2019 [43] that FINA's Doping Panel issued Sun with a warning but imposed no penalty on Sun despite the heavy criticism levelled at the swimmer and his entourage by the International swimming federation's Doping Panel. As a result of that newspaper report, WADA investigated the matter and appealed the FINA decision to the Court of Arbitration for Sport. [44] Later, in July 2019, News Corp in Australia, part of the same media group as The Sunday Times in London, published in full the report FINA had kept secret. [45]
A three-member CAS panel found Sun guilty of refusing to co-operate with sample testers and banned him from competitive swimming until February 2028. [46] [47] However, Sun's lawyers appealed the ruling, which was widely celebrated but also criticised in some quarters. [48] [49] On December 22, 2020, the Swiss Federal Tribunal set the CAS award aside due to the perceived bias of the president of the panel, who before the Sun Yang case came to light had tweeted comments in opposition to videos showing animal cruelty in China that included a racial slur. [50] In addition, another arbitrator, Romano Subiotto, had been sitting on a WADA's working group, [51] though this was no impediment to him serving on a CAS panel. After a second hearing, which unlike the first was not held in public, Sun's suspension was reduced to four years and three months, opening up the possibility of the swimmer being able to participate in the 2024 Olympics, even though it would turn out that his ban would not end until after China's Olympic swimming trials for the Paris Games. [52]
On 20 April 2024, The New York Times revealed that 23 members of the Chinese swimming team tested positive for a performance-enhancing drug called Trimetazidine seven months prior to the start of the 2020 Summer Games and were allowed to participate in the games with some of the swimmers winning medals. Following the publication of the report, Travis Tygart, CEO of the United States Anti-Doping Agency, accused the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the Chinese Anti-Doping Agency (CHINADA) of covering up doping by Chinese swimmers. [53]
WADA argued the amount detected was too low to enhance performance, and CHINADA, who had reported the results to WADA and FINA (now World Aquatics), blamed them on contamination from a hotel kitchen, a rationale that potentially exempts findings from being made public. [54] WADA released a statement, explaining that "[it] was not possible for WADA scientists or investigators to conduct their enquiries on the ground in China given the extreme restrictions in place due to a COVID-related lockdown. WADA ultimately concluded that it was not in a position to disprove the possibility that contamination was the source of TMZ and it was compatible with the analytical data in the file." [55] World Aquatics's investigation agreed with WADA. [56]
After the story was leaked, WADA was criticised by the United States Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) and athletes. WADA's choice of a Swiss attorney to lead an investigation into the matter also drew criticism because he was hand-picked by the agency. [57] Experts interviewed by The New York Times said trace amounts of TMZ can be detected near the end of a doping excretion period but could not rule out contamination either. [58]
In a second statement, Tygart accused both World Anti-Doping Agency and the Chinese Anti-Doping Agency for not being transparent about the findings and keeping "clean athletes in the dark". WADA was also accused of having a double-standard as Russian figure skater Kamila Valieva tested positive for TMZ and used the same excuse, but was subsequently banned for four years. WADA argued, based on non-published information and pharmacokinetics, that contamination would not have been possible in Valieva's case, but in the case of the Chinese swimmers, that no international competition was occurring around the time of the positive tests, only athletes who stayed at one of the hotels tested positive, and some individuals alternated between positive and negative results all point to contamination, not doping. [59] [60]
In May 2024, WADA announced that it hold an extraordinary meeting to discuss the doping case of the Chinese swimmers. [61] [62] WADA said it asked USADA to produce the whistleblowers alleging doping by the Chinese but has received no response, adding that American athletes had "some of the most elaborate and surprising contamination scenarios" in the past, "including, just to give a few examples, contamination through dog medication, contamination by kissing a girlfriend who had bought medication purchased on holiday in India, contaminated tap water, and many others." USADA hit back at WADA criticising it for attacking the messenger and its lack of transparency. [63] [64] The United States has threatened to stop funding WADA and called the FBI to look into the matter. [54]
Eleven of the 23 swimmers involved in the controversy were named to the 2024 Chinese Olympic swimming team. [65] In June 2024, Michael Phelps and Allison Schmitt criticized the WADA in a US Congressional hearing. [66] [67]
In August 2016, the World Anti-Doping Agency reported the receipt of phishing emails sent to users of its database claiming to be official WADA communications requesting their login details. After reviewing the two domains provided by WADA, it was found that the websites' registration and hosting information were consistent with the Russian hacking group Fancy Bear. [68] According to WADA, some of the data the hackers released had been forged. [69]
Due to evidence of widespread doping by Russian athletes, WADA recommended that Russian athletes be barred from participating in the 2016 Rio Olympics and Paralympics. Analysts said they believed the hack was in part an act of retaliation against whistleblowing Russian athlete Yuliya Stepanova, whose personal information was released in the breach. [70] In August 2016, WADA revealed that their systems had been breached, explaining that hackers from Fancy Bear had used an IOC-created account to gain access to their Anti-doping Administration and Management System (ADAMS) database. [71] The hackers then used the website fancybear.net to leak what they said were the Olympic drug testing files of several American athletes who had received therapeutic use exemptions, including gymnast Simone Biles for methylphenidate, tennis players Venus Williams (for prednisone, prednisolone, triamcinolone, and formoterol), and Serena Williams (for oxycodone, hydromorphone, prednisone, prednisolone, and methylprednisolone), and basketball player Elena Delle Donne (for an amphetamine and hydrocortisone). [72] The hackers focused on athletes who had been granted exemptions by WADA for various reasons. Subsequent leaks included athletes from many other countries. [71]
The Anti-Doping Convention of the Council of Europe in Strasbourg was opened for signature on 16 December 1989 as the first multilateral legal standard in this field. It has been signed by 52 states including all 47 member states of the Council of Europe and non-member states Australia, Belarus, Canada, Morocco, and Tunisia. [73] The convention is open for signature by other non-European states. It does not claim to create a universal model of anti-doping, but sets a certain number of common standards and regulations requiring parties to adopt legislative, financial, technical, educational and other measures. In this sense the Convention strives for the same general aims as WADA, without being directly linked to it.
The main objective of the convention is to promote the national and international harmonisation of the measures to be taken against doping. Furthermore, the Convention describes the mission of the monitoring group set up in order to monitor its implementation and periodically re-examine the list of prohibited substances and methods which can be found in an annex to the main text. An additional protocol to the Convention entered into force on 1 April 2004 with the aim of ensuring the mutual recognition of anti-doping controls and of reinforcing the implementation of the Convention using a binding control system.
Given that many governments cannot be legally bound by a non-governmental document such as the World Anti-Doping Code, they are implementing it by individually ratifying the UNESCO International Convention against Doping in Sport, the first global international treaty against doping in sport, which was unanimously adopted by 191 governments at the UNESCO General Conference in October 2005 and came into force in February 2007. As of April 2020, 189 states had ratified the convention, setting a UNESCO record in terms of speed.
The UNESCO Convention is a practical and legally binding tool enabling governments to align domestic policy with the World Anti-Doping Code, thus harmonizing the rules governing anti-doping in sport. It formalizes governments' commitment to the fight against doping in sport, including by facilitating doping controls and supporting national testing programs; encouraging the establishment of "best practice" in the labelling, marketing, and distribution of products that might contain prohibited substances; withholding financial support from those who engage in or support doping; taking measures against manufacturing and trafficking; encouraging the establishment of codes of conduct for professions relating to sport and anti-doping; and funding education and research.
It was revealed in May 2011 that the American National Football League (NFL), which had previously resisted more stringent drug testing, might allow WADA to conduct its drug tests instead of doing it in-house. This could lead the way to testing for HGH, which had previously been without testing in professional American football. [74] However, as of September 2013 [update] , cooperation was stalemated because "blood-testing for human growth hormone in the NFL had been delayed by the NFL's players union, who had tried 'every possible way to avoid testing'". [75] As American football players do not participate in international sporting events, that issue is not a top priority for WADA. [76]
The International Olympic Committee is a non-governmental sports organisation based in Lausanne, Switzerland.
World Athletics, formerly known as the International Amateur Athletic Federation and International Association of Athletics Federations and formerly abbreviated as the IAAF, is the international governing body for the sport of athletics, covering track and field, cross country running, road running, race walking, mountain running, and ultra running. Included in its charge is the standardization of rules and regulations for the sports, certification of athletic facilities, recognition and management of world records, and the organisation and sanctioning of athletics competitions, including the World Athletics Championships. The organisation's president is Sebastian Coe of the United Kingdom, who was elected to the four-year position in 2015 and re-elected unopposed in 2019 for a second four-year term, and then again in 2023 for a third and final 4 years.
The United States Anti-Doping Agency is a non-profit, non-governmental 501(c)(3) organization and the national anti-doping organization (NADO) for the United States. To protect clean competition and the integrity of sport and prevent doping in the United States with a performance-enhancing substance, the USADA provides education, leads scientific initiatives, conducts testing, and oversees the results management process. Headquartered in Colorado Springs, Colorado, USADA is a signatory to the World Anti-Doping Code, which harmonizes anti-doping practices around the world, and is widely considered the basis for the strongest and strictest anti-doping programs to prevent doping in sport.
In competitive sports, doping is the use of banned athletic performance-enhancing drugs (PEDs) by athletic competitors, as a way of cheating. As stated in the World Anti-Doping Code by WADA, doping is defined as the occurrence of one or more of the anti-doping rule violations set forth in Article 2.1 through Article 2.11 of the Code. The term doping is widely used by organizations that regulate sporting competitions. The use of drugs to enhance performance is considered unethical, and is prohibited by most international sports organizations, including the International Olympic Committee. Furthermore, athletes taking explicit measures to evade detection exacerbate the ethical violation with overt deception and cheating.
Trimetazidine is a drug sold under many brand names for angina pectoris. Trimetazidine is described as the first cytoprotective anti-ischemic agent developed and marketed by Laboratoires Servier (France). It is an anti-ischemic (antianginal) metabolic agent of the fatty acid oxidation inhibitor class, meaning that it improves the heart muscle's ability to use glucose as a fuel by inhibiting its use of fatty acid metabolism. It has become controversial for its use as a performance-enhancing drug, with several scandals involving its use erupting at successive Olympic games.
Competitors at the Olympic Games have used banned athletic performance-enhancing drugs.
Sun Yang is a Chinese Olympic and world-record-holding competitive swimmer. In 2012, Sun became the first Chinese athlete to win an Olympic gold medal in men's swimming. Sun is the first male swimmer in history to earn Olympic and World Championship gold medals at every freestyle distance from 200 to 1500 metres. A three-time Olympic gold medalist and eleven-time world champion, he is the most decorated Chinese swimmer in history. In 2017, NBC Sports described him as "very arguably the greatest freestyle swimmer of all time".
The Russian Olympic Committee is the National Olympic Committee representing Russia. Its president is Stanislav Pozdnyakov. On 12 October 2023, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) suspended the membership of the Russian Olympic Committee.
The Russian Federation competed at the 2012 Summer Olympics in London, United Kingdom, from 27 July to 12 August 2012. This was the nation's fifth consecutive appearance at the Summer Olympics as an independent nation. The Russian Olympic Committee sent a total of 436 athletes to the Games, 208 men and 228 women, to compete in 24 sports. For the first time in its Olympic history, Russia was represented by more female than male athletes.
China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), conducted a state-sanctioned doping programme on athletes in the 1980s and 1990s. The majority of revelations of Chinese doping have focused on swimmers and track and field athletes, such as Ma Junren's Ma Family Army (馬家軍). However, doping is reported to also occur for fitness tests as part of the zhongkao.
Travis Thompson Tygart is an American lawyer and CEO of the United States Anti-Doping Agency (USADA). He is best known for his role in exposing Lance Armstrong's massive doping operation.
Doping, or the use of restricted performance-enhancing drugs in the United States occurs in different sports, most notably in the sports of baseball and football.
Australia has been at the forefront in the fight against doping in sport. It was one of the first countries to establish a sports anti-doping agency and is a member of World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA). Australia abides by World Anti-Doping Code. In 2010, Australian John Fahey was re-elected as President of WADA for a second and final three-year term which finished at the end of 2013. Australia like other major countries has been embroiled in major doping in sport controversies and issues.
The swimming competitions at the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo were due to take place from 25 July to 6 August 2020 at the Olympic Aquatics Centre. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the games were postponed to 2021. However, their official name remained 2020 Summer Olympics with swimming events set for 24 July–1 August 2021 and marathon swimming set for 4–5 August 2021.
The Russian Anti-Doping Agency, established in January 2008, is the Russian National Anti-Doping Organisation (NADO), affiliated with the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA).
Systematic doping of Russian athletes has resulted in 50 Olympic medals stripped from Russia, four times the number of the next highest, and more than 30% of the global total. Russia has the most competitors who have been caught doping at the Olympic Games in the world, with more than 150.
The women's 4 × 200 metre freestyle relay event at the 2020 Summer Olympics was held in 2021 at the Tokyo Aquatics Centre. It was the event's seventh consecutive appearance, having been held at every edition since 1996.
The International Testing Agency, often referred to by the acronym ITA, is an independent organisation constituted as a non-profit foundation which implements anti-doping programs for international sports federations, major event organizers or any other anti-doping organisation requiring support. The organisation was created in 2018 under the supervision of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the International Olympic Committee (IOC) to promote independence, expertise and transparency in the global fight against doping. Its headquarters are located in the city of Lausanne in Switzerland.
The Enhanced Games is a planned international sports event where the athletes will not be subject to drug testing. It is headed by Aron D'Souza, an Australian businessman. The event is meant to take place in 2025. Reactions from the sporting world have been generally negative, with commentators highlighting the safety risks of encouraging performance-enhancing drug use.
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