http://www.smh.com.au/sport/olympic...inese-positive-drug-test-20160812-gqqw2d.html
Rio de Janeiro: The Chinese Swimming Association has confirmed Chinese swimmer Chen Xinyi has failed a doping test at the Rio Olympics.
Chen, who came fourth in the women's 100m butterfly final, tested positive for hydrochlorothiazide (HCTZ) on Sunday, a diuretic banned for its potential to mask the use of other performance-enhancing drugs.
First...Is there a genuine
MEDICAL use of diuretics for genuine medical conditions ? Yes.
http://www.news-medical.net/health/What-Are-Diuretics-Used-For.aspx
Diuretics are used to treat several conditions in medicine including heart failure, high blood pressure, liver disease and some types of kidney disease.
So taking a diuretic under medical supervision, such as a general practitioner MD, is nothing to be concerned about.
Second...So what made Chen Xinyi different ? What is it about hydrochlorothiazide (HCTZ) ? Is this diuretic a legitimate drug ? Yes, it is.
http://www.webmd.com/drugs/2/drug-5310/hydrochlorothiazide-oral/details
This medication is used to treat high blood pressure. Lowering high blood pressure helps prevent strokes, heart attacks, and kidney problems. Hydrochlorothiazide is a "water pill" (diuretic) that causes you to make more urine. This helps your body get rid of extra salt and water.
All Chen had to do is submit a medical exemption request to WADA showing she needs this drug to treat a persistent medical condition, such as any of the listed.
But if Chen made no exemption request, what non-medical use could there be for hydrochlorothiazide ?
According to WADA, of which China and Russia are
FOUNDING MEMBERS therefore privy to everything this organization does, usage of hydrochlorothiazide for non-medical purposes is a
TACTICAL decision.
http://www.doping-prevention.de/sub...gents/diuretics-and-other-masking-agents.html
Hydrochlorothiazide can be used to dilute urine sample of anything excreted by the body.
Anyone who is a regular coffee drinker knows caffeine is a mild diuretic and urine color is darker in the time after a few cups of coffee. Drinking water eventually dilute the urine of caffeine and the urine gets gradually lighter.
What hydrochlorothiazide does is act its diuretic properties and make the athlete take more than normal urine breaks. If the athlete takes any banned performance enhancing drug (PED) that is sampled thru urine testing, a diluted urine will lower the odds of detection of that banned PED.
The WADA reasoning, of which China and Russia must have agreed upon since they were
FOUNDING MEMBERS, is that the detection of hydrochlorothiazide without the presence of an exemption must be cause for suspicion.
Chen had no exemption because she could not provide a credible argument for its use.
WADA classified hydrochlorothiazide as 'masking' agent, not a PED. In other words, using hydrochlorothiazide to make difficult the detection of something else. Hydrochlorothiazide does not enhance any aspect of the human physiology, other than the urge to urinate.
This is why neither the Chinese nor Russian governments made any official protests over the WADA exemptions for these targeted Western athletes. They knew exactly the purposes of the substances, how they work in the human body, how they are used legitimately and illegitimately, and when each should be allowed.