The CAS decision of the International Court of Appeal for Sports reveals in detail what all the preparations Russian sports doctors said Kamila Valieva used in 2020-2021.
– It feels pretty hard when it’s about a young athlete, a long-term sports doctor Harri Hakkarainen updates while reading an excerpt from the decision of the International Court of Appeal for Sports.
As a result, the Russian figure skater Kamila Valieva17, received a four-year doping penalty remains valid.
CAS’s 129-page decision contains 425 points. Among them, number 49 is interesting. In it, the Russian medical authority (known in the papers as FMBA) lists about 60 different preparations that Valiyeva used in 2020 and 2021.
Valiyeva was 13–15 years old in the time window.
Although the preparations are not prohibited, Hakkarainen states that he has not come across similar amounts even in Finnish adult athletes.
– I have once met a few Finns who have had a list of twenty nutritional supplements in a doping test. But here are more than 20. Closer to thirty. In addition, there are many medicinal substances.
Hakkarainen highlights the medicinal product Grippferon from the list, in which the active ingredient is called Interferon alfa. In Finland, Interferon alfa is mainly used to treat serious diseases such as cancer. On the other hand, in Russia it can also be a flu medicine.
– I don’t know at what stage it was used and for what purpose. Interferon alfa is not some basic drug prescribed to a 13- or 15-year-old.
Hakkarainen emphasizes that Valijeva has certainly not used all the products on the list at the same time, but that the use has been spread over two years.
– There were four different anti-inflammatory drugs. It is unlikely that he has eaten all of them at once.
Has any disease been caused?
According to Hakkarainen, the list includes nausea and diarrhea medicines and allergy medicines that affect intestinal absorption and microbial flora.
He does not believe that there is a natural explanation behind the large amounts of medicine.
– Does he really have that many allergies and intestinal problems (as the listing suggests)? Or do we try to keep the intestines in order with medicines, when he has eaten so many different products that the intestines have started to show symptoms? Hakkarainen ponders.
In the CAS decision, it is stated that Valieva was found to have so-called athlete’s heart from the end of 2020. Athlete’s heart refers to changes in the heart’s structure and electrical activity caused by long-term physical training.
– No wonder with that product description, Hakkarainen states, referring to the listing provided by Valieva’s defense.
– Russian athletes usually have a long list of different nutritional supplements and amino acid derivatives. But now it’s about such a young girl. The question arises as to whether an illness was caused here first and then the consequences have to be treated, Hakkarainen ponders.
Valieva’s four-year competition ban is dated to start on the day of the race, i.e. 25 December 2021. Thus, he will have time to be released from the competition ban before the Winter Olympics starting in February 2026, whose figure skating will be contested in Milan, Italy.