WADA Independent Investigator Richard McLaren and Fancy Bear Hack Team Agree: ADHD Medications Being Abused via WADA Loophole

Richard McLaren, the attorney and law professor hired by WADA to lead an independent commission into state-sponsored doping by the Russian government, has gone on record with comments that surprisingly support the main premise put forth by the Russian hacking group known as Fancy Bears. That is, WADA's TUE system provides a legal loophole for some athletes to cheat the system.

McLaren recently told the BBC that he believes athletes are “probably” abusing therapeutic use exemptions (TUEs) to unfairly enhance their performance.

"Probably, yes. It would depend which sport,” McLaren told the BBC. “One would have to conduct investigations on specific sports as to whether or not too many TUEs are being used with respect to particular substances. One of the common TUEs is for ADHD medication. There may be abuse there.

“That's one area that probably needs to be looked at - how frequently are [certain medicines] being used in particular sports?”

USADA CEO Travis Tygart has accused the Fancy Bear Hack Team of the “cyber-bullying of innocent athletes” with its release of confidential TUEs. Tygart failed to realize that rather than condemning individual athletes, the Fancy Bear revelations are a condemnation of WADA, USADA and the secrecy of the TUE system.

There is something wrong with a system in which WADA and USADA secretly allow some athletes to use steroids and amphetamines while they publicly punish other athletes for using the very same steroids and amphetamines. The lack of full disclosure is an impossible position to defend especially when any potential abuses of the TUE system are kept strictly secret and are not available for public scrutiny. In other words, the abuses are being covered up.

Professor McLaren only pointed out the obvious fact that the TUEs were probably being abused by some athletes. McLaren believes ADHD medications, including performance-enhancing stimulants such as Ritalin (methylphenidate) and Adderall (amphetamines), are particularly problematic.

American gymnast and multiple gold medalist Simone Biles and American basketball player and gold medalist Elena Delle Donne were two of the very first athletes who TUE records were leaked by Fancy Bear. Both athletes had WADA-approved therapeutic use exemptions to use ADHD medications on a daily basis for a 4-year period extending through most of 2018.

McLaren did not point fingers at any specific athletes but suggested that the high numbers of TUEs for ADHD medications in certain sports may be questionable.

Thus far, WADA has refused to address any shortcoming of its TUE system as a potential legal loophole for PED abuse. Rather, WADA has done everything possible to decry the hacking incident as a nefarious Russian plot of retaliation for McLaren's report on Russia and WADA's recommendations to ban the entire Russian team from the 2016 Rio Olympics.

This makes it particularly interesting that McLaren has broken with the WADA talking points and has chosen, albeit inadvertently, to validate Fancy Bear's skepticism of WADA-approved TUEs.

Source:

BBC. (September 16, 2016). TUE system can be abused by athletes - Dr Richard McLaren. Retrieved from http://www.bbc.com/sport/37382825