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Samples will be kept for a decade in an effort to catch up with the increasingly sophisticated methods used by athletes who take banned substances. Source: News Limited |
AFL players tested for doping will see their samples stored for 10 years under a new global crackdown on sports cheats.
The AFL is among 24 international bodies to sign up to a World Anti-Doping Code 2015, which aims to catch up with the increasingly sophisticated methods used by athletes who cheat their way to triumph.
The new code, outlined in the British Journal of Sports Medicine, advises storing athletes’ samples for a decade, so technology can ultimately catch up with cheats using performance-enhancing substances that prove initially undetectable.
The new code, drafted after a meeting of major sporting codes, medics and doping experts, also says athletes should have “biological passports”.
These will allow the identification of tiny changes to an athlete’s genetic blueprint caused by doping without the need to identify the particular substance.
The journal also highlights last year’s Essendon supplements scandal as cause for “close scrutiny of support staff’’, and calls for strong forensic investigations by police, border patrols, postal services and internet monitoring.
Soccer greats such as Wayne Rooney and Cristiano Ronaldo and Australia’s Socceroos will be among the first athletes required to give samples under the new “freeze and store’’ requirement, at June’s World Cup in Brazil.
AFL players would be subject to the same stringent conditions soon after.
But the league is yet to outline logistics such where samples would be stored, how frequently tests would occur, and who would be tested.
The shake-up could have huge ramifications.
It raises the prospect of stars being stripped of accolades such as the Brownlow Medal even after they have retired, if re-examined test samples return a positive result for banned substances.
In extreme cases, a clubs could even be stripped of a past premiership if its players were later found guilty of doping.
AFL spokesman James Tonkin said the league was taking a hardline approach to doping.
“The AFL is supportive of any initiatives that assist in combating the risk of doping in sport, by enhancing detection techniques and strengthening the deterrence factor,’’ he said.
“Our experience shows it is equally important to invest in investigative techniques and forensic intelligence to support athlete testing regimes.’’
The chief medical officer of soccer’s world governing body FIFA, Professor Jiri Dvorak, said some athletes were “a step ahead of the science’’ and continued to dope.
“There is a strong evidence that if you re-analyse the samples from past years, that new methods would find them. This is a deterrent,’’ he said.
FIFA, the International Olympic Committee, the World Anti-Doping Association and the International Swimming Federation have also all signed up to the accord.
Sports physician Dr Peter Larkins said the new code was a “legitimate and great way’’ to put athletes on notice that they would face greater, and extended, scrutiny.
But he warned there was uncertainty about the accuracy of tests taken from samples long-term.
“We don’t know how long you can leave it,” he said. “And the scientists say you’ve only got one opportunity to thaw out the sample and analyse it.
“So you have to be absolutely certain of what drug you are looking for, because you won’t be able to thaw it out and try again in two years.’’
Uncertainty surrounding the accuracy of drug tests from older samples could open the door for legal challenges from players who subsequently test positive.
Ten-year testing is also likely to prove costly: the AFL, which began freezing samples in 2010, conducts about 1000 tests each year.
The Australian Sports Anti-Doping Authority last year admitted stockpiling the blood samples of about 1000 athletes, including AFL and NRL players and Olympians, in early 2011 because of concerns about testing standards and the use of banned peptides.
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