JADCO teams up with international partners

Chairman of the Jamaica Anti-Doping Commission (JADCO) Alexander Williams, said the organisation has formed an amalgamation with anti-doping entities from a number of overseas countries that will see these agencies conducting out of competition drug testing on Jamaican athletes, while they are abroad.

Williams said as part of the partnerships, JADCO will also conduct out-of-competition drug tests on athletes from these overseas territories whenever they are in the island.

"For Canada, for the United States and for some other territories, what we have are partnership arrangements where if an athlete (travels to one of these countries), out-of- competition testing will be conducted, where we will have their doping officers, on the behalf of JADCO, doing the testing," Williams told The Gleaner.

"It is reciprocated ... if their athletes are here ... then we can do the testing here as well," he added.

Williams described the move as an excellent one for his organisation because the process has gone well so far and his association has not received any complaints to date.

"What we are trying to do is to maintain our standing. We understand and recognise that Jamaica is under a microscope and so we need to ensure that we do things at the utmost integrity and we do the best that we can at all times," said Williams, who lauded the operations between the countries.

"They have been working well and I am pleased to say that it is smooth and it is seamless and we have had no complaints so far because their co-operation have been excellent," he said.

The credibility of Jamaica's anti-doping programme was brought into question in 2013 after several issues concerning governance and testing practices were revealed. This led to the resignation of the then board of directors and several other moves aimed at improving the country's drug-testing machinery.