Testing, sanctioning of components of anti-doping system to be independent from IOC

In the upcoming Tokyo Olympics, both the testing and the sanctioning components of the anti-doping system will be independent from the International Olympic Committee (IOC).

The ITA and the Court of Arbitration for Sport Anti-doping Division (CAS ADD) will handle these respectively. Addressing the Session, the Chair of the ITA Foundation Board, Valerie Fourneyron, provided a final overview of the Pre-Games Testing programme for Tokyo 2020.

“Following the postponement of the Games, the ITA Pre-Games Expert Group recalibrated its efforts in 2020 and reviewed all 33 participating sports and their athletes likely to compete in the Games,” a statement from IOC read.

“In December 2020, more than six months before the Games, the group issued over 25,000 testing recommendations – making this the most extensive pre-Games anti-doping programme ever implemented for an edition of the Olympic Games.

“This first phase of the Tokyo 2020 anti-doping programme has been completed, with an implementation rate of 80 per cent for the qualified athletes who were recommended for testing by the ITA Pre-Games Expert Group,” it added.

According to IOC, during Games time, the ITA plans to collect approximately 5,000 in- and out-of-competition urine and blood samples in collaboration with Tokyo 2020 and the Japan Anti-Doping Agency (JADA), and with the support of an anti-doping workforce of 250 Doping Control Officers and 700 Chaperones

Meanwhile, WADA urged all Anti-Doping Organisations (ADOs) in the lead-up to the Games to ensure that all athletes bound for Tokyo were properly tested, and in order to ensure that no athlete currently suspended takes part in Tokyo 2020.

The Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO) Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus is in Tokyo and addressed the International Olympic Committee as athletes gear up for the Tokyo Olympics.

Taking to Twitter, he wrote: “Glad to be in #Japan to address the International @Olympics Committee. I’ve come with a simple but urgent message: we can defeat #COVID19, but only if everyone plays their part. May these #Tokyo2020 Olympics be a source of hope & unity to achieve #VaccinEquity & end the pandemic.”

Three days out from the opening ceremony of the upcoming Tokyo Olympics, the total Games-related Covid-19 infections have risen to 67.