Every player at the 2014 World Cup in Brazil will be
required to have a biological passport, the sport’s world governing body FIFA
announced on today.
FIFA intend to introduce the system of biological
profiling at this year’s Confederations Cup in Brazil, as part of the worldwide
crackdown on doping in sport and it should be fully operational by the next
World Cup.
A delegation from the World Anti-Doping Agency
(WADA) met FIFA officials at their Zurich headquarters on Thursday, and WADA
president John Fahey said his agency was “very satisfied with the commitment of
FIFA on the biological profiles”.
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FIFA medical officer Michel D’Hooghe said: “FIFA was
the first international organisation for team sport to start with longitudinal
profiles.”
He explained that FIFA is developing plans to
introduce profiling, including a steroid profile through urine and a blood profile,
for the Confederations Cup, where in- and out-of-competition tests would be
conducted on all participating players, as well as unannounced blood testing at
training camps and games.
“And it’s our commitment to have all players
participating at the 2014 FIFA World Cup having biological profiles,” he added
Biological profiling is considered one of the most
effective methods of detecting the use of performance-enhancing drugs and blood
boosters like EPO.
EPO was first tested for by FIFA at the 2002 World
Cup where all players had to underego urine and blood testing and whenever the
results were abnormal, an EPO test was performed. All results were negative.
FIFA is also developing the hormonal profiling project,
a new initiative in collaboration with the WADA-accredited laboratory in
Switzerland.
“There is always more which can be done in the fight
against doping, but we know FIFA has always been serious in this domain,” Fahey
said.
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