Drug testing coming within the next six months

Local sportsmen and women, especially those on national representative teams, are being notified that within the next six months they will be subjected to random drug testing.{{more}}

That was the word from Barbadian Dr. Adrian Lorde, Chairman of the Regional Anti Doping Organisation (RADO).

Lorde made this revelation to SEARCHLIGHT last Friday, March 18, at Frenches House, at the winding down of a two-day anti doping workshop mounted by the St. Vincent and the Grenadines National Anti- Doping Orgganisation (NADO), in collaboration with the National Commission for UNESCO.

Lorde said that the testing is in keeping with the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) to rid sports of those who used performance enhancing drugs and other forms of prohibited drugs.

“They can be tested in competition, out of competition. The control officers can turn up at your work place, and demand that you be tested,” Lorde said.

Lorde said that the exercise is an expensive one, hence it will be funded by WADA.

“We have all the kits. Everything is in place,” Lorde, a Barbadian added.

Lorde said that national associations will have to submit to the local Doping Control Officers a list of their current crop of national payers.

Additionally, information on the whereabouts of the athletes and other personal data about them are compulsory.

And, Lorde reiterated that according to the WADA stipulations, failure to take the test or give incorrect information is tantamount to a failed test.

The RADO Chairman, who along with the RADO’s regional co-ordinator Neil Murrell formed part of the resource personnel at the workshop, said that his team will be back here in St. Vincent and the Grenadines next month to meet with the Director of Physical Education and Sports, the Minister of Sports and heads of all national sporting bodies to further advance the process.

The two day workshop titled: “Understanding Prohibited Substances in Sport” was deigned for at Physical Education and Sports teachers, coaches, sports administrators, national sports men and women, and the Vincentian sporting community in general.

Local officers Dr. Perry De Freitas and Rudi Daniel were also part of the resource team.

Participants were exposed to topic such as Doping Control Procedures, Health Consequences of Substances, Therapeutic Use of Exemptions, Testing Procedures, Anti Doping Rules and Responsibilities, In and Out of Competition Testing, as well as Healthy Alternatives.

In addition, a list of substances on the banned list of prohibition was given out to those in attendance.

St. Vincent and the Grenadines is a member of the Caribbean RADO which is a member of the WADA.