Coronavirus Pandemic Hobbles World Antidoping Efforts

Traditionally, people who use performance-enhancing drugs do so for a period of a few weeks to a few months. The drugs allow athletes to train harder and recover more quickly, so they become stronger and fitter. Athletes try to time their doping cycles ahead of major competitions, where they are most likely to be tested, but not so far ahead that they can’t sustain the gains they have made with the drugs.

Most major athletic competitions have been suspended at least for the next month or two.

The International Olympic Committee on Monday announced that the postponed Tokyo Games would take place in July and August of 2021. Niggli said any athlete serving a suspension that extended through this summer’s postponed Olympics but that was due to end before the new dates would be allowed to compete next summer in Tokyo.

Any effective testing program requires at least a six-month lead before a major competition, Niggli said, and that amount of time would not have been available had the Games opened this July as scheduled.

National antidoping agencies and international sports federations typically administer about 300,000 tests annually. They are likely to conduct far fewer this year.

Sebastian Coe, the president of World Athletics, the governing body for track and field, on Friday described the number of tests as an “old-fashioned” metric to gauge the effectiveness of antidoping measures, but he acknowledged that the coronavirus was causing problems for antidoping efforts.

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/30/sports/olympics/coronavirus-doping-athletes-olympics.html