• Submitted by: admin
• Sports
• Politics and Government
• 02 / 19 / 2007

By: Francisco Mastrascusa

Some 2,000 samples were analyzed last year at the Anti-doping Laboratory in Havana, which attests to the contribution of Cuba to the world fight against cheating in sports.

This was confirmed by Dr. Mario Granda, director of the institution, who noted that analyses carried out domestically save a large amount of foreign currency, because internationally the cost of a test runs between $150 and $200 dollars - though in Cuba these go for around $70.

"In 2006, the Cuban lab assisted the Venezuelan Olympic Committee by virtue of existing collaboration agreements between the two countries. Likewise the institution responded to requests made by the organizers of the World Judo Youth Championships which took place in the Dominican Republic, and to requests by other nations in the region, such as Mexico (prior to the Central American Games)," emphasized the director of the Institute of Sports Medicine.

To these services can be added 803 examples of others provided by the Central Crime Laboratory, the Institute of Legal Medicine, the Center for Genetic and Biotechnological Engineering, and the Institute of Toxicology, among other Cuban scientific institutions.

Granda categorically affirmed that no Cuban athlete has been sanctioned recently for using illegal substances, although he recognized that they were inconclusive cases that required other studies in order to throw out doping.

"All human organisms produce substances, such as testosterone and epitestosterone, that when their incidence appears at relatively high levels are considered suspect. These discrepancies are not always the outcome of the use of anabolic steroids or their precursors, sometimes they have a physiologic character," he pointed out.

Speaking on how cases reach the laboratory, Granda explained, "We dont deal with the names of the athletes processed, because we receive numbered samples, without any other type of identification. Once detected, discoveries are immediately reported to AMA, the international federations and the sampling agency. These, with their medical commissions, are who determine if the situation constitutes positive cases or not."

The Anti-doping Laboratory of Cuba was inaugurated on February 13, 2001 and received simultaneous certifications from COI and WADA on September 23, 2003.

Source: Juventud Rebelde