Dr.Hab., Professor, Merited Worker of Science and Technology of Ukraine, Laureate of the State Prize of Ukraine in the field of Science and Technology, Professor of the chair of history and theory of the Olympic sport at the National University of Physical Education and Sport of Ukraine, Editor-in-Chief of “Science in Olympic sport” V.N. Platonov

Keywords: doping in Olympic sport, anti-doping activities, WADA, the World Anti-Doping Code, WADA prohibited list, crisis phenomena, rights of athletes and physicians.

Introduction. Doping is a phenomenon that occupies a particular place in high performance sport. The use of doping is in contradiction with the basic principles of sport, the ideals and values of the philosophy of Olympism. It is quite natural that the International Olympic Committee has fought against this phenomenon for more than half a century, and, in 1999, initiated the establishment of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), a special international organization designed to fight doping, particularly on the World Olympic stage. However, the agency’s years-long effort, along with the constantly increasing legal, financial and human capabilities, continuous improvement and revision of main documents, active information and propaganda activities, expansion and tightening of sanctions, not only have not solved the issue of the fight against doping, but have made it more severe. The number of doping scandals and acute conflicts in various Olympic sports only increase, charges and penalties may be imposed not only on the athletes, but also on the coaches, physicians, attendants, and sports officials. The UN, UNESCO, Council of Europe, leaders and high-ranking representatives of the governments of many countries are involved in the issue. In the media, doping scandals overshadow the sporting events themselves that adversely affects the credibility and popularity of the Olympic Games and compromises the Olympics in public consciousness by associating them with widespread fraud and corruption.

However, all this is not happening in the most popular kinds of professional sport: football, golf, car racing, boxing, North American team sports (baseball, American football, basketball, and hockey). Here, the fight against doping and other negative phenomena is carried out and is carried out actively, but without dramatization; isolated violations and scandalous incidents and punishments have occurred, but their level and number are incomparable with the immensity of the sporting activity itself and do not have a significant impact on the popularity and credibility of the sport. But all these kinds of sport are extremely popular among spectators, mass media, and sponsors; and, in this regard, some of them not only compete, but also surpass in popularity the Olympics.

Thus, experts, sport fans, and the general public ask a natural question: why the issue of doping in the Olympic sport is immeasurably more acute than in professional sports? They have found the answer in the methodology to the fight against doping. In Olympic sports, it was shaped by the World Anti-Doping Agency with the support of the IOC, whereas governing bodies in the above-mentioned professional sports strongly disagree the WADA’s policy, implement their own approaches to counteract doping, and decline to cooperate with WADA.

So it makes sense to look into whether the issue of doping in the Olympic sport is so severe that it poses a threat for it or the system of the fight against doping, corporate and professional interests of the anti-doping system created by the WADA turn it into one like this.

Objective of the study was to make a critical analysis of the problematic situation with the use of doping in the Olympic sport.

Results and discussion. Now it becomes clear that most of the issues associated with doping, resulted from the methodology underlying the activity of anti-doping agency, which was fundamentally incorrect, but actively imposed on the global community [4, 6, 14]. The fallacy of this methodology, which over the years has been subjected to justified criticism from prominent members of biological, medical, and sport sciences, and of elite sport, has manifested itself in many ways, the most important of which are:

• Strange, devoid of any scientific basis, the “Fundamental rationale for the World Anti-Doping Code”, which, instead of strict scientific data and clear criteria derived from them, has as its ground rather an abstract notion of the “spirit of sport”, an ambiguous notion, which has a number of meanings and is associated with categories such as intuition, imagination, feeling, consciousness, etc.; it is the subject of eternal philosophical discussions and has no objective evaluation criteria. Vague, devoid of a clear methodology the “Fundamental rationale for the World Anti-Doping Code” resulted in all the ensuing issues related to the content of the Code and practical activity focused on its implementation.
• The frankly erroneous definition of the term “doping”, which contradicts scientific principles and generally accepted definitions contained in encyclopedic and special publications, according to which doping is understood not as the use of substances and methods that enhance physical and mental activity of an athlete, but as a violation of numerous anti-doping rules, the vague rules allowing arbitrary interpretation. Suffice it to say that, according to the Code [22], “Anti-Doping Rules are not intended to be subject to or limited by the requirements and legal standards applicable to criminal proceedings or employment matters. The policies and minimum standards set forth in the Code represent the consensus of a broad spectrum of stakeholders with an interest in fair sport and should be respected by all courts and adjudicating bodies”. This approach, which is very strange from a legal point of view, has been worsened by a peculiar definition of “a broad spectrum of stakeholders”, which is represented exclusively by officials of the organizations of the international Olympic system (IOC, NOC, ISF), national governing bodies of sports, and a number of international organizations.
• The lack of clear criteria for including substances and methods on the Prohibited list. Criteria, which are contained in the World Anti-Doping Code, completely blurred the line between prohibited and permitted substances and methods, and WADA get an opportunity to arbitrarily manipulate the Prohibited list. This seems especially dangerous given that according to the Code “WADA’s determination of the Prohibited Substances and Prohibited Methods that will be included on the Prohibited List and, the classification of substances into categories on the Prohibited List, and the classification of a substance as prohibited at all times or In-Competition only, is final and shall not be subject to challenge”, and that the substances and methods may be included on the Prohibited List only by WADA “sole discretion” [2].
• WADA’s management has brought to the development of the anti-doping system experts in the field of economics, management, jurisprudence, analytical chemistry and physics and virtually put aside representatives of biological and sport sciences, and sport medicine.
• Rash “pushing” and the adoption in 2003 of the obviously imperfect World anti-doping code, which has been rushed with great difficulty through the numerous complaints and criticisms by “... manipulations, appeals, cajoling and lashing” [16] and the subsequent unprincipled and extremely bureaucratized improvement of this document in subsequent versions. The World Anti-Doping Code has become the extremely voluminous, complex and extremely difficult to understanding document. The code is comprised of 25 articles, each of which consists of from 2-3 to 10-13 parts (a total of about 120), lots of comments, additions, amendments, various kinds of explanations, examples, and exceptions (often unexpected). And all this applies only to the core document. The most ridiculous statement of the Code is that the blame for the violations of clutter of articles, sections, exemptions, clarifications, etc., amounting to hundreds, is placed on the athlete, who has neither knowledge nor experience in this area. Therefore, experts reasonably argue that it is impossible to comply with the requirements of the Code without special education of a wide range of professionals involved in the training and competitive activity of athletes [14]. Unfortunately, WADA does not think about this.
• The policy of double standards underpins the practical activities of the anti-doping system and manifests itself in rigidity and bias with respect to both individual athletes and national teams along with unexplained liberalism toward others. Scandals related to doping in various countries have become commonplace in the Olympic sport that is not surprising if objectively treat controversial and inefficient activities of WADA. Surprising is the fact that in some cases they just go unreported and sink in bureaucratic marshlands, while in the other they are artificially inflated and accompanied by widespread investigations and unfair propaganda [1, 6, 12, 16].
• Moving the issue of doping in Olympic sports from a purely sporting sphere of moral-ethical, competitive and medical nature to the political level and its use in achieving the objectives on the world political scene.
• Massive violations of the rights of the athletes compared to other people in respect of their autonomy, self-determination, private life, and health care that contradict with several articles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights adopted by the United Nations and the established legislative standards of various countries [10, 14, 20].
• Lack of understanding of the fact that modern sport is characterized by training and competitive activities, which put an enormous amount of load on the athlete's body and mind. This stress is the basis to achieve a higher level of sports mastery and compete successfully on the international sport scene. At the same time, it is the source of a significant risk to the health of an athlete, including the possibility of sudden death, and prevention of these phenomena is possible only when the athlete uses the entire arsenal of modern medicine, including pharmacological agents [5, 7].
• Frankly scandalous operating style of anti-doping services, which constantly violate the principle of privacy and fill the media space with suspicions, rumors and threats, much of which is unfounded and finds no confirmation, but seriously undermines the credibility of athletes, adversely affects their preparation and participation in competitions, and creates an unhealthy environment around sports and major competitions.
• Complete monopolization by WADA of anti-doping activities in the field of the Olympic sport, the misunderstanding that the basis of progress are free competition and counteraction to monopolization, which creates obstacles for the introduction of new ideas, approaches, and solutions. The most surprising thing is that it happened in a very complex, contradictory, ambiguous, and unexplored field of knowledge and practice, successful development of which is possible only through competition of ideas and practical solutions. The result of such monopolization has become WADA’s consumerist attitude to Olympic sport, its disrespectful attitude to the medical, biological and sport sciences, and dismissive attitude to alternative approaches to combating doping [7].
• Inability to learn from the experience of professional international and national federations, having been leading the fight against doping as one of a number of negative phenomena in the field of sport for many years. In many sports (car racing, golf, boxing, football, baseball, American football, basketball, ice hockey, etc.), the fight against this phenomenon is quite active, but the rights and interests of an athlete are taken into account, there is no excessive dramatization, as well as the specifics of a particular sport and risk factors for its popularity and development are considered.
• Turning the fight against doping into the field of both legal and illegal commercial activities in the various forms that involve interests of representatives of different spheres, ranging from manufacturers of medicinal products and analytical equipment to suppliers, designers of pharmaceutical programs, staff of anti-doping laboratories, coaches, doctors, and athletes themselves.
• Inexplicably low percentage of positive test results (a little over 1 % of positive samples and the same amount of dubious results from more than 200 thousand tests every year), whereas numerous scientific data and the results of anonymous surveys show that, in many sports, prohibited substances and methods applied by the majority of the athletes up to 75-80 % or more. It also looks strange the sudden appearance of a large number of positive results in backup samples when there is a need or desire for sampling investigation of backup samples of particular athletes [15, 19, 21].
• Inadmissible limitations for athletes, as employees of the most dangerous occupation, which is fraught with serious consequences for the health, on the use of the achievements of modern pharmacology for the improvement of the professional activity, prevention of disease and risk of sudden death, therapy, and rehabilitation. Unlawful restriction of the rights and responsibilities of physicians when performing their professional duties that are based on the principle of confidentiality, the obligation to act without delay in the interest of the patient using their professional knowledge, experience, and cutting-edge medical advances [2, 8, 14].
• The concentration of WADA’s research solely on improving the system of detection of prohibited substances and methods: the means that increase the level of oxygen saturation in blood, exogenous and endogenous anabolic steroids, the means of increasing the height, gene technologies, etc.; the complete lack of interest in research projects focused on studying the ergogenic aids and methods that naturally fit in with training and competitive activities and ensure the prevention of injuries and diseases, the effectiveness of treatment and rehabilitation.
• Ignoring the results of numerous scientific studies and practical recommendations relating to improving organizational and managerial, moral, ethical, psychological, healthcare, legal, sports and pedagogical aspects of the fight against doping [9, 13, 17, 18, etc.]. A large amount of objective information accumulated in these areas do not affect in any way the policies and practices of WADA, which only has been bureaucratized, but remains unchanged since the establishment of the Agency [2, 3, 11].
• Antiscientific attitude to dietary supplements industry, allegations that there is “no convincing scientific evidence that dietary supplements bring significant benefits to elite athletes”, that “elite athletes can and should meet the requirements of exhausting training schedule solely through healthy food”.
• Failure to keep pace with the development of pharmacological science and pharmaceutical industry that resulted in that anti-doping laboratories have become able to identify many of the prohibited substances and methods, in most cases, only 10-20 or more years after their active usage; this makes senseless WADA’s approaches to combating doping, which only stimulate the development and introduction of new, generally more dangerous to health, substances.
• A chronic lagging of the anti-doping system behind the achievements of pharmacology and pharmaceutics along with the inability to identify new substances and doping methods consistently introduced into sport are offset by the introduction of unacceptable methods to detect violators: humiliating persecution of athletes, interference with their privacy, and the use of various kinds of unethical indirect methods including provocations and denunciations. The attempts of cooperation with the pharmaceutical companies focused on the inclusion in the composition of medicinal products of marker substances, which can retain in the body for a long time are illegal and pose a serious general societal danger [7].

Thus, it becomes apparent that an organization such as WADA fails to solve the issue of doping on the basis of a document such as the World Anti-Doping Code. This is more than amply demonstrated by the views of experts, who claim that the use of doping in sport is constantly increasing, while WADA and persistent doping scandals provide a powerful means of indirect advertising, which demonstrates that high sport performance cannot be achieved without doping and stimulates the development of increasingly complex, costly and dangerous to the health drugs and means of concealing their use.

Therefore, if the task is really to fight doping in the Olympic sport, rather than strengthen WADA and maintain the initially defective World Anti-Doping Code, it is necessary to go a radically other way than the one chosen for the Olympic movement by WADA and representatives of various international organizations, who support its policy.

In the following, we briefly delineate the areas of activities, which could normalize the situation with doping and resolve the contradictions in this matter between representatives of different structures of the international Olympic system.

•  Implementation of extensive educational programs among all participants in the Olympic movement, starting from children's sport schools and sport clubs to the IOC and national Olympic committees, international and national sport federations, and national governing bodies of sports.

•  Substantial revision of the World Anti-Doping Code on the basis of the methodology grounded on the achievements of the advanced sport and health sciences and generally accepted international legal framework; realization of the fact that anti-doping activity is one of the many activities in the field of sport, but is not the superstructure over sport.

•  Transition of the fight against doping into one of the areas of sport medicine and medical care of athletes; application of medicinal substances in accordance with the requirements of legitimate medical practice with exclusion of emotional and subjective criteria.

•  Change of the status of WADA and anti-doping laboratories by removing their rights as independent institutions, standing above sports and reorganization of these institutions into subdivisions of the international Olympic system with the methodological guidance of the IOC Medical Commission with the crucial role of experts in sport medicine and elite sport.

•  Conducting extensive research to develop a system of aids and methods allowed for the use in sport, to minimize the number of prohibited substances and methods, to define clear boundary between permitted and prohibited items with consideration of the specifics of different sports and in partnership with experts in the fields of organization and management of sport, theory and methodology of athlete’s training, medicine, pharmacy, jurisprudence, etc.

•  Providing athletes with opportunities to use all of the advances in modern medicine, not interfering and not restricting them in applying the most effective medicines for therapeutic purposes; bringing athletes' rights in full compliance with the rights of employees of dangerous occupations.

•  Enabling physicians to use for the medical care of athletes (including preventive) the entire range of legal drugs in accordance with the drug regimens that are evidence-based and recommended by medical science.

•  Establishment of alternative anti-doping laboratories and centers applying various approaches to solve the issue of doping in sport.

•  Providing ISF with an ability to engage in the delivery of services for sporting events and sports those anti-doping laboratories and centers, whose activities can best meet the specific needs of a particular sport, sport federation, etc.

•  Recruitment and promotion to decision-making positions in the overall anti-doping system of experts in the field of sport medicine, who have deep understanding of the specific features of modern sport and the system of athletes’ training. As for the “effective executives/managers”, their role should be limited to the implementation of policies adopted by the experts of sports and sport medicine.

•  Democratization of the fight against doping from the side of the IOC: support of alternative approaches to combating doping, promotion of the activities of anti-doping laboratories, which use different approaches to combating doping, shift in emphasis in the fight against doping into the scope of the activities of federations, etc.

Conclusion. There is a need for extensive educational and training programs imbued with the respect for the personality of an athlete, his rights, views, ethical principles, and moral values. It is this approach that will be consistent with the spirit of sport and the principles of fair play. It is this approach that was advocated by the founder of the modern Olympic movement, Pierre de Coubertin. This was also pointed out by equally distinguished leader of the International Olympic movement Juan Antonio Samaranch before leaving the post of the President of the IOC, where he stayed for more than 20 years.

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Corresponding author: vladimir@platonov.org.ua

Abstract. The paper analyses the modern history of the spread of doping in the Olympic sport, the IOC’s fight against this negative phenomenon and activities of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) established in 1999 and designed to eradicate doping. It is shown that, despite the ever-increasing financial and human resources along with expanded legal capabilities, intensive propaganda efforts, increased volume of testing, severe sanctions, support from reputable international organizations (UN, UNESCO, Council of Europe), the Agency's multi-year activities is not only brought the Olympic sport closer to solving the problem, but also dramatically aggravated and made it dangerous for the credibility and the well-being of the Olympic movement. It is not only and not so much about the competition in elite sport, which has dramatically increased in recent years, and socio-political and commercial attractiveness of success at the Olympics, but about the fundamentally misguided methodology underlying WADA’s activities and based on the neglect of the achievements in biological, medical and sports sciences, and the realities of the modern elite sport, and drawn up on the ideas of lawyers, economists and “universal managers". The paper outlines in detail outcomes of the activities of the WADA and anti-doping laboratories accredited by the Agency, which manifested themselves in many crisis phenomena moved far beyond the limits of the Olympic sport. Furthermore, the prospects of coming out of the grave crisis developed in this area are delineated.