PCSM can only do normal dope tests

With a depleted staff and a meager budget, the Philippine Center for Sports Medicine does not have the capability to screen or monitor all Filipino athletes even before they get to compete in any international competition.

Dr. Raul Canlas, head of the PCSM and chairman of the medical committee during the recent Southeast Asian Games, admitted during yesterday’s SCOOP sa Kamayan forum that it is quite impossible for the PCSM to do this.

"We don’t have the capability," said Canlas, one of the country’s best sports surgeons.

Canlas said what the PCSM can do is to make Filipino athletes undergo normal doping tests that are only good enough to detect whether an athlete is taking marijuana, shabu or any other prohibited drugs.

Canlas said this is the type of test being required for those applying for jobs or a driver’s license. He said this test costs only P100, which is much cheaper than that doping tests required for athletes.

Canlas said the tests which is used to detect the presence of performance-enhancing drugs in an athlete costs from $150 to $400 depending on the number of athletes. Over 200 ingredients branded as illegal among athletes can be detected using this type of test.

In Asia, medical facilities capable of making this test are found only in China, Japan, Korea, Malaysia. Most European countries and of course the United States have the facilities for this.

The PCSM was thrust into the picture recently after a Filipina gold medalist in the SEA Games last December, taekwondo’s Ester Marie Singson, was tested positive of diuretics, not a performance-enhancing drug but a masking agent for other banned substances like steroids.

Singson’s urine samples were found containing traces of diuretics when it was subjected to testing in a medical facility in Beijing. The said facility is recognized by the World Anti-Doping Agency or WADA.

Canlas said the PCSM was created in 1991, the year after the birth of the Philippine Sports Commission, and then it catered only for close to 200 athletes.

"But the problem is that we now have smaller staff and a smaller budget while the number of athletes are growing bigger. The national pool is increasing," said Canlas. — Abac Cordero