The World Anti-Doping Agency has made public the 2019 prohibited list.
The 2019 Prohibited List was published by WADA. A vintage that focused on organizing different substances and methods in a more structured way. The 2019 Prohibited List will come into force on January 1. It will be effective on 1er next january.
The reference document
The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) has released the List of prohibited substances and methods 2019 (the List), Summary of the main changes and explanatory notes for 2019And the 2019 Monitoring Program. The List, which was approved by WADA's Executive Committee on September 20, 2018, will come into effect on 1er January 2019.
The List, which is one of the six International Standards that all signatories du World Anti-Doping Code (the Code)are required to comply, lists the substances and methods that are prohibited in and out of competition, as well as the substances that are prohibited in certain sports.
"WADA is pleased to announce the publication of the 2019 Prohibited List," said Olivier Niggli, Director General of WADA. Updated annually, this document is one of the cornerstones of the world anti-doping program. Each year, we revise the List in consultation with many partners. It is essential that we stay one step ahead of those who want to cheat the system and, as a result, the experts reviewing the List take into account many sources, including scientific and medical studies, doping trends, and intelligence obtained from law enforcement and pharmaceutical companies. "
Order and supervision
Few notable changes for this edition. Experts focused on reorganizing the general presentation of prohibited substances and methods to better meet the challenges of current doping. It is all the same interesting to note that caffeine, considered as a doping product until 2004, is in the list of substances under surveillance. Nicotine also, alongside Bupropion (often used for smoking cessation), phenylephrine (anticoagulant), phenylpropanolamine (nasal decongestant), pipradol (stimulant) and synephrine (alkaloid present in certain plants and in certain animals). These products are not banned, but will be the subject of an in-depth sports impact study and could eventually become part of the List. It is therefore necessary to be vigilant about them.
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Caffeine has been a known stimulant for centuries. We even know with certainty nowadays that it is both psychic and physical stimulant. But, given its extensive use by humans, it seems impossible to ban it completely in sport. Especially since it would be necessary to ban the consumption of coffee, tea and chocolate which contain all three.
The first bans in sport logically focused on stimulants and it is even they who feed the longest list of prohibited substances. WADA specifies that "All stimulants are prohibited" and that all analogues, by chemical structure or biological effect, of a listed stimulant molecule are also prohibited. So there is no other solution than to keep caffeine under surveillance since it cannot be authorized or prohibited as the World Sport Code would like.
Nicotine :
Nicotine is a paradoxical stimulant. It instantly produces relaxation (parasympathomimetic effect) but the body reacts just as instantly to adrenergic stimulation (sympathomimetic) exactly the opposite. This paradoxical effect leads to a powerful addiction in humans who find twice their happiness there.
In the athlete, nicotine can be dangerous because the heart needs to know in which direction it must make an effort. It cannot be both more and less of the risk of causing a heart rhythm disorder. Therefore, the expected benefit is above all predictable before physical effort and to prevent stress from entering the stadium, track, courts, etc.
As with caffeine, given its extensive use by humans, it seems impossible to ban it completely. So there is no other solution than to keep it under surveillance since it cannot be authorized or prohibited as the World Sport Code would like.
Bupropion :
Smoking cessation is mainly done by direct substitution with nicotine, in particular in a much more effective patch, although the success is quite limited (20% maximum success at 1 year).
Bupropion is considered a stimulant because its chemical structure is derived from amphetamine and its effect at the cellular level increases circulating dopamine and norepinephrine. However, WADA specified that any molecule having a structural relationship or an effect comparable to another stimulating molecule (here amphetamine) should be banned. In other words, in the doubt of a clearly demonstrated doping effect, they are all prohibited.
If the stimulating molecules had all the same effects and were really comparable to amphetamine or any other reference molecule, there would not be as many molecules available that differed from each other in structure or effect. So, what is punishable with molecules like bupropion is the search in itself for a doping effect, even without demonstrated success. The search for a doping effect is contrary to the ethics of sport, one of the three items set by the World Sports Code. But, in doubt of a demonstrated effect on performance, WADA has chosen for the moment to put it only under surveillance.
The role of WADA is to ban all substances: 1- which have an effect on performance, 2- which endanger the health of athletes or 3- which are unethical in sport. Consequently, all drugs and substances likely to have an effect on the body are intended to be banned. Which is all in all logical.
The difficulty is then to be able to identify them in the laboratory without being mistaken in eliminating the false positives. The search for a fair sanction would also require taking into account a demonstrated effect on performance and therefore on obtaining a place or an unjustified gain. As for the effect on health, it goes without saying that the risk is never zero to obtain an undesirable effect more or less serious in the short, medium or long term on an organism launched at full physiological speed as required. the high sporting level.
To achieve this, it is essential to monitor all substances to better understand them before including them in a prohibited list.
