Watch your Supplements daily...

A quick review of some recent news items, that beg for a question to the World Anti-Doping Agency.

That question is: "If your mandate calls for cleaning the world of Sport from Doping, whose responsibility is it to police the purveyors of Nutritional Supplements?"

And that isn't even THE harsh question, which would be reserved to the purveyors of 'so-called' Athletic Nutritional Supplements:

"Dude! Would you rather keep your profits, or see them lost in another Court Case?"

With that introduction, WADAwatch points to this recent article...

Austrian skier wins settlement with drug company

By NATHANIEL VINTON

Quote:
The case was about to go to trial in U.S District Court in New Haven when the skier's American lawyer, Howard Jacobs, won a dismissal with the settlement, the terms of which are confidential.

"I can tell you that Hans was very happy with the terms of the settlement, and he's looking forward to the next thing," Jacobs, who represents numerous athletes accused of doping, told the Daily News. "That's one of the things that doesn't get talked about. A lot of the athletes have positives not because they're trying to cheat. It's because of inadvertent things."

Inadvertent things, which do happen to be 'the responsibility' of the Athlete, no doubt about it. But their task of monitoring 'supplements' should be easier.


Governments that have signed the UNESCO Convention (Article TEN), which treaty helped to justify legally the existence of WADA and its mandate(s), are theoretically charged with efforts to (amongst many other things):

● Encourage producers and distributors of nutritional supplements to establish ‘best practice’ in the labelling, marketing and distribution of products which might contain prohibited substances

WADA's work on this topic, vital to its established goals, seems to have no coherent recent measures taken, if searching by its website for 'nutritional supplements' is any indication (the majority of the top ten 'hits' for that search reveal documents from 2004, 2005, 2003: where's the BEEF?).


When will WADA convene the Member States to start this huge snowball rolling? Working within the intergovernmental systems, such as the UN, are not rapid engagements.


And don't forget: a State not in compliance with ALL the WADA-System, is ineligible to bid, after January, 2009, for the Olympics. WADA CODE 20.1.8 reminds us of one of the responsibilities that WADA has charged to the International Olympic Committee:

20.1.8
To accept bids for the Olympic Games only from countries where the government has ratified, accepted, approved or acceded to the UNESCO Convention and the National Olympic Committee, National Paralympic Committee and National Anti-Doping Organization are in compliance with the Code.

So there's no time to be a-wasting, friends.


Before ONE MORE Athlete is screwed for life, by a hasty and ill-timed purchase, it would be nice to see WADA working with the Horseracing Forensic Laboratory, of England (see our piece from October 2007), to put together such a program that makes profit-seeking nutrient sales companies aware of the damage they do, to some innocent, some purposeful customers.


NB: the details of the above settlement that Jacobs engineered, are confidential, but it wouldn't surprise us if skier Knauss could afford to buy himself and his family a nice little Austrian Alpine Hotel... he deserves no less.

Disclaimer

The opinions expressed by WADAwatch are
strictly formed with the purpose of inciting WADA to adhere
to its Fundamental Rationale, achieve its goals and fulfil
the aspirations of its Signatories, in achieving the
highest possible level of objective, neutral
science in sport-doping control.

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