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Re: Essendon under AFL investigation regarding 2012 fitness program
Has anyone seen the Patrick Smith article on the weekend about lab rats?
Has anyone seen the Patrick Smith article on the weekend about lab rats?
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Western Bulldogs Football Club "Where it's cool to drool" -
Re: Essendon under AFL investigation regarding 2012 fitness program
It seems to have dropped off. I think you have to join the Australian to see them.
The upshot is that he compared what happened to Essendon players with little to no follow checks and reviews to make sure what was being administered wasn't harming the players.
In comparison to the checks and balances for the lab rat experiments the players don't appear to have received the same duty of care.Western Bulldogs Football Club "Where it's cool to drool"Comment
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Re: Essendon under AFL investigation regarding 2012 fitness program
If you kicked five goals and Tom Boyd kicked five goals, Tom Boyd kicked more goals than you.
Formerly gogriffComment
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Re: Essendon under AFL investigation regarding 2012 fitness program
The future remains unclear for players treated like lab rats
THE position in which Essendon finishes on the ladder this season will not be decided by the players under the control of coach James Hird. Essendon's fate is in the hands of ASADA and the AFL tribunal.
The Bombers might not have a premiership point to their name when the inquiry into possible use of performance-enhancing drugs at the club last year finishes next month. If ASADA does not whack the club, the AFL Commission most certainly will. For the players themselves, the future is less clear.
They found themselves in a club where Ziggy Switkowski's report found "a disturbing picture of a pharmacologically experimental environment never adequately controlled or challenged or documented within the club".
That's the chemical chaos in which the footballers at Essendon found themselves. The chief executive of the players' union, Matt Finnis, unsurprisingly, feels his members have been betrayed.
"From the moment they come into the game, players are told to put their trust and confidence in the experts, the medical advisers, the fitness staff in relation to any kind of supplements that they are going to take. That's because it is quite a complex area," Finnis said this week.
"I think what the (Essendon) players have done we would expect any prudent responsible player to do, and they have relied upon that advice. If they have been let down by that, ultimately under the eyes of the WADA code, then the responsibility for that will be sheeted home.
"But let's not forget these players were placed in an absolutely untenable position where they have been allegedly administered substances which were not approved for human use. Regardless of whether or not these were performance-enhancing, let's not lose sight of the bigger picture -- that no player should ever go to work in a workplace which can be described as pharmacologically experimental."
To understand how significant was the breach of trust and the limited governance applied by all levels of Essendon's management, you need to know that rats get better care than was afforded the players last year. Yep, rats.
We know what happened at Windy Hill. For example, skipper Jobe Watson, the club's most important player, believes he was given a peptide AOD-9604 which has not been cleared for human consumption. Players were assured the drug was WADA compliant and were asked to sign a form of consent and confidentiality. During the year, Watson said, the amount of injections he received was unprecedented in his football experience. Certainly, it is not in anyone's football experience to be taken off-site for injections to be administered.
At best, Essendon was running unsophisticated clinical trials. At worst, it was a jab-and-see recklessness. It shames the club that laboratory rats get much better care and protection. For example, to use a drug like AOD-9604 on a rat at a research institute a highly qualified scientist with a doctorate in pharmacology must:
lSubmit an animal ethics proposal to the pertinent animal ethics committee.
lIdentify the exact aim of the study -- say, to build muscle bulk/observe energy consumption.
lEstimate the size of effect expected and calculate the minimum number of rats needed for experiment.
lDesign a pilot study to establish the minimum effective dose to administer without causing harm. Monitor rats, report back to the committee all findings.
lCommittee would then decide whether further experimentation was ethical and humane and that the animal's welfare has not been compromised.
l Only then can the full experiment go ahead while continuing to monitor rats (weighing the animals daily, checking for clinical signs of illness or distress);
lIf anything occurs outside initial predictions in ethics (increased mortality, complications, side-effects) researchers must front ethics committee with an adverse incident report. Studies can be stopped either indefinitely or permanently.
It is evident that Switkowski and Finnis do not believe any such precautions -- nothing like them -- were in place at Essendon. Said Finnis: "The information that's been before me thus far indicates that no players have been willing participants in any activity designed to cut corners or gain unfair advantage. On the information given to me, I'm not sure what more players can do."
Switkowski's report read in part: "Following concerns about the program in January, the senior coach reasserted the principles about the supplement program that:
lAny supplement must be WADA and ASADA compliant.
lIt must not be harmful to players health.
lPlayers must be properly informed about anything entering their bodies.
lEvery product was to be cleared by the doctor.
"These guidelines were reasonable and unambiguous, but compliance required robust recording and monitoring processes which proved inadequate."
It is known that Essendon players have been rattled in their ASADA interviews by the mention of possible dramatic and insidious side-effects of drugs used last year.
This lack of governance issue has haunted Essendon since chairman David Evans announced in February the club had called in ASADA to investigate the 2012 supplements program.
The more that is learned, the more it is obvious that a large slab of the club management must go. The board members need to reassess their future, Hird and his coaching panel must be replaced and the medical team renewed.
Instead, to quote the great Malcolm Blight, those at fault at Essendon don't give a rat's tossbag.Western Bulldogs Football Club "Where it's cool to drool"Comment
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Re: Essendon under AFL investigation regarding 2012 fitness program
Double postFFC: Established 1883
Premierships: AFL 1954, 2016 VFA - 1898,99,1900, 1908, 1913, 1919-20, 1923-24, VFL: 2014, 2016 . Champions of Victoria 1924. AFLW - 2018.Comment
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FFC: Established 1883
Premierships: AFL 1954, 2016 VFA - 1898,99,1900, 1908, 1913, 1919-20, 1923-24, VFL: 2014, 2016 . Champions of Victoria 1924. AFLW - 2018.Comment
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Re: Essendon under AFL investigation regarding 2012 fitness program
Throw them out of the league.Time and Tide Waits For No ManComment
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Re: Essendon under AFL investigation regarding 2012 fitness program
Again he hasn't though. I know it a technicality but he said he believes that is what he was given. He leaves an element of doubt and I have no doubt in my mind that he was very well coached before giving that interview.Comment
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Re: Essendon under AFL investigation regarding 2012 fitness program
Reported on AFL 360 it appears Essendon were given misleading information by ASADA indicating that AOD9604 was not a prohibited substance under S2 of the prohibited substance list. Gerard Whately believes that no infringement notices will be issued to any Essendon players.Comment
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Re: Essendon under AFL investigation regarding 2012 fitness program
that was reported 5 months ago. Essendon haven't been able to find the piece of paper yet though I had thought.
I also heard that WADA dont really care for that as an excuse.
Fun times ahead.Comment
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Re: Essendon under AFL investigation regarding 2012 fitness program
What a pissy technicality. Even the local village idiot knows that AOD9604 is banned under S0 categorisation, not S2.
It seems Whately is just as much of an AFL cheerleader as the common garden variety bogan tabloid scribes."Look at me mate. Look at me. I'm flyin'"Comment
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Re: Essendon under AFL investigation regarding 2012 fitness program
That is correct about the categorisation, however it appears that the information supplied to Essendon from ASADA was that AOD9604 was not a banned substance under S2. This was confirmed in an official statement this evening.
WADA has confirmed again that the drugged was banned under S0. Who knows what the outcome of the investigation will be. Still hope they throw the book at Essendon, although it seems unlikely.Comment
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