International Olympic Committee (IOC) President Thomas Bach has announced a $10 million action plan against doping, broken into four parts.
Bach made the announcement at the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) World Conference on Doping in Sport. The conference took place in Katowice, Poland. Bach pledged $10 million in U.S. Dollars from the IOC. He also encouraged individual government authorities to commit money of their own.
Bach’s speech also centered on what he said was a need for increased focus on the “entourage” of athletes involved in doping cases. “We need zero tolerance for everybody: athletes AND entourage,” he said, per the IOC press release.
Here’s the breakdown of Bach’s $10 million pledge:
$5 Million For Storage of Pre-Games Testing
Bach expects the IOC to commit about $5 million to finance storage facilities that will house samples for 10 years. The samples are to be collected during the pre-Olympic testing period, and will be stored for a decade after the Olympics. That allows samples to be tested as new methods for discovering banned substances become available.
$2.5 Million For Further Research
Bach commits $2.5 million to more research into testing and detection methods. Bach also specifically challenged governments to match the IOC‘s financial investment into the WADA research budget.
$2.5 Million for strengthening WADA’s investigative powers
Bach specifically points to WADA’s Intelligence and Investigative Unit, created in 2016. The IOC says it will commit $2.5 million to that entity for the next Olympiad.
Collection of Samples For Genetic Sequencing Test Before Test is Validated
Genetic sequencing is a new theoretical method of testing samples for doping violations. The method, though, hasn’t yet been validated. However, Bach called for the International Testing Agency (ITA) to start collecting samples as early as the 2020 Olympics, even if the new testing method hasn’t been validated yet. The idea would be that if the new testing method is validated, samples from the Tokyo Olympics could immediately be tested.
