Supplements can lead to positive tests

ATHLETES take supplements stand a one in five chance of testing positive for a banned substance and it is unlikely that the supplement will be of any use at all, the chairman of the Irish Sports Council’s anti-doping committee warned yesterday.

Dr. Conor O’Brien was speaking as the Minister for Arts, Sport and Tourism, John O’Donoghue, signed the Copenhagen Declaration Against Doping in Sport with a warning that Ireland intends to play its full part in the global fight against doping in sport.

And Dr. O’Brien’s advice on supplements was quite simple: Don’t take them. If you feel unwell or feel you need a tonic go to your doctor and he or she will prescribe something that is safe, efficient and will not result in a positive test.

“If you take them (supplements) you have a one in five chance of having a positive test,” he said. “And we don’t believe they work to any great extent and, in fact, they may cause side-effects.

“There are three things about supplements that we now know. The first thing is that they don’t work. All the research has indicated that there is very little proper positive scientific data to say supplements make any difference.

“The people who advertise them or sell them will give this nebulous research that is rarely ever published in proper medical journals.

"They almost play on the insecurities of athletes by saying you need to take something.

"A big issue about them is that we now know in the last year that one in five of all supplements used and sold in Europe are contaminated by agents that will cause a positive drug test.

"You have a one in five chance of having a positive test if you take these agents and those odds are bad. If you are messing with those agents you are taking an unnecessary risk of having a positive test.

“Are they safe? In the main many of them are not safe. In the case of iron supplements - anyone who has worked in a casualty department will know that you often get children coming in who have taken their mothers’ iron tablets and they may be extremely unwell and extremely sick.

"Many of those food supplements have all been showed to cause medical side-effects.

“Even going back to our annual Creatine debate, some of the research from France last year showed that it may be a much more serious agent to be taken and if it is cooked in a particular way it may in fact cause significant side affects.”

He warned that many of the supplements that are being used - particularly what he called the internet supplements - were made in small garage operations.

He said they were not made by the pharmaceutical companies and on Monday and Wednesday this company might well be making a supplement but on a Tuesday and a Thursday might well be making an anabolic agent.

Supplements could become contaminated because the pipes and the various materials and substances used are the same.

Sports Minister John O’Donoghue said he was pleased to say that Ireland’s formal ratification of the Council of Europe’s Anti-Doping Convention came into effect on March 1.

“This ratification has been a most significant development in that it confirms that our national anti-doping programme has gained the seal of approval internationally.”