Chinese anti-doping body slams New York Times for violating media ethics

BEIJING, June 18 (Xinhua) -- The Chinese Anti-Doping Agency (CHINADA) has criticized a New York Times report suggesting that Chinese swimmers were involved in doping in 2016 and 2017, calling it "a violation of media ethics and morals."

The New York Times reported last week that three Chinese swimmers tested positive for clenbuterol in 2016 and 2017 but were not suspended.

In response, CHINADA sent replies to the New York Times and AFP on Monday, stating that the three athletes had ingested clenbuterol through meat contamination inadvertently. According to world anti-doping rules, no public disclosure or sanctions are necessary under such circumstances.

In its reply to the NYT, CHINADA condemned the report, saying, "We have noticed the unauthorized disclosure of unpublished documents and information, and the privacy of the athletes (including minors) by media like the New York Times, who misinterpreted the positive findings for clenbuterol caused by meat contamination as intentional doping by the athletes," read the statement to the NYT. "This is a violation of the media ethics and morals, an attempt to mislead public understanding on anti-doping work and caused a severe damage on the reputation of WADA, CHINADA and the global anti-doping system."

"CHINADA deplores and rejects this, and reserves its right to take legal action as appropriate against the New York Times and other media for their reports and statements that are contrary to basic facts," CHINADA said.

The agency pointed out that the misleading report showed bias and an attempt to politicize the doping fight. "Despite the fact that meat contamination with clenbuterol is not exclusively a Chinese issue, the New York Times and media alike only questioned the Chinese athletes, which show their serious bias against China's anti doping efforts, and that they are attempting to politicize the fight against doping by manipulating public opinion and misleading the public through the constant publication of distorted and confusing reports," CHINADA said in a statement to AFP.

CHINADA revealed that the three athletes underwent a total of 72 tests conducted by both CHINADA and FINA (now known as World Aquatics) between 2016 and 2017.

"That means 12 tests per athlete per year on average. Only one positive result for extremely low concentration of clenbuterol was detected for each one of them," it said.

After investigating the cases, CHINADA concluded that the adverse analytical findings for clenbuterol were isolated cases resulting from the athletes' ingestion of meat contaminated with clenbuterol.

"Therefore, it was decided that no sanctions would be imposed on the athletes involved. The decisions of these cases were submitted to WADA and FINA in a timely manner and were recognized by them," CHINADA said.

The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) released a statement on Friday supporting CHINADA's decision.

"Given the sensationalist and inaccurate way that the New York Times has covered the trimetazidine contamination cases of 23 Chinese swimmers from 2021, as well as the highly charged, politically motivated criticism of WADA and the global anti-doping system that followed, mainly from within the United States, WADA feels it is important to be able to describe the context and extent of clenbuterol contamination around the world so that people are not further misled," WADA said.

According to WADA, each of the three swimmers was found to have levels of clenbuterol so low that they were between six and 50 times lower than the minimum reporting level of 5 ng/mL, which was introduced into anti-doping rules in 2019 to address the issue of clenbuterol contamination in meat.

These cases were reviewed by the relevant International Federation, World Aquatics (then known as FINA), and it did not contest the contamination scenario.

WADA Director General Olivier Niggli said: "The issue of contamination is real and well-known by the anti-doping community."

"The fact that the New York Times is only asking questions about China when meat contamination is an issue in many countries, shows again how this is an attempt to politicize anti-doping. From WADA's perspective, we must assess each case on its individual merits regardless of the athlete's nationality," he said.