Gene Doping

Yesterday, I interviewed for The Kojo Nnamdi Show (Washington, USA) on the subject of gene doping. It was one of the more interesting, on-air debates I have had on this subject and we covered a lot of ground. Other guests included:

Dr. Gary Wadler, Sports physician, clinical associate professor of medicine at New York University and expert on sports doping

Richard Pound, Chairman, World Anti-Doping Agency

Jose Canseco, Former all-star baseball player and author of the book “Juiced: Wild Times, Rampant 'Roids, Smash Hits, and How Baseball Got Big”

Osagie Obasogie, Project Director on Race, Disability, and Eugenics, Center for Genetics and Society.

It was particularly nice to debate with Gary Wadler and Richard Pound whom I have not met in person. It appeared to me that the gene doping debate is a rich subject for society, in part for the reasons i have argued elsewhere. It does seem to provoke alarm bells which suggest that more is at stake than the usual concerns surrounding doping. Genetic science and technology does not have the same connotations for people as drug use.

This is quite useful from my perspective because it could yield a new kind of debate about doping and even transform the way in which anti-doping takes place.

Bioethics in Barcelona

Before I forget, I must mention something about the Barcelona meeting (Ethics and Philosophy of Emerging Medical Technologies, Institut Borja de Bioetica, Universitat Ramon Llull, Barcelona, Spain), since sport appeared in a good handful of papers including:

Keynote paper on Therapy and Enhancement
Professor Ruth Chadwick

Argued in favour of the term 'improvement' rather than enhancement, as a basis for characterising the ethical issues arising from emerging technologies.

Ethical norms for research on biomedical enhancement susing human subjects
Professor Max Mehlman

Max has written considerably on genetic enhancement and regularly uses sport as a case study in his work. The military was also a theme and there are some great analogies between sport and the military.

Honorary session for Lennart Nordernfelt

Thomas Schramme developed a case to inquire into the concept of 'health' the focus of this session and a tribute to Nordenfelt who gave an introduction and reply. Schramme's case discussed Lily, an athlete who wanted to jump 2m. He argued that Nordernfelt's work would argue that her inability to jump this high would qualify as failing to meet a vital goal and that, therefore, we could characterise it as an illness that should be alleviated by medicine. In short, we would characterise her less than healthy.

Schramme rejected the idea that this inability should be characterised as an illness and rejected the idea that the realisation of all vital goals falls within the proper role of medcine. Nordenfelt agreed with Schramme's conclusion, but did not accept that Lily's interest to jump 2m could be described as a vital goal. Being the best is not a reasonable expectation, but being good is.

Athlete or Guinea Pig? Sports and Enhancement Research
Nancy M.P. King and Richard Robeson

Argued that medicine for the athlete should be characterised as enhancement research, but currently it is not. This led to some interesting debates about whether sport technology should go through a more rigorous liability check and whether this should be connected to anti-doping policy. I argue for this in my 2005 piece in the European Journal of Sport Science, though their emphasis is on medical procedures. I wonder whether blood spinning might fall within this category.

Finally, there was my wee paper

Posthuman Medicine & Imagined Ethics
Developed posthuman theory in relation to transhumanism and cyborgology and subsequently argued for the need to consider imagined ethical issues. Used the gene doping case as an example of an 'imagined ethical' debate.

Is 'Gene Doping' Wrong?

This is the title of an article I recently published with Project Syndicate. Rather than repeat the entire article here, I will just paste links to its various translations:

Is 'Gene Doping' Wrong? (English, by Andy Miah)

¿Es inaceptable el “dopaje genético”? (Spanish, Translated by Carlos Manzano)

Что плохого в «генетическом допинге»? (Russian, Translated by Николай Жданович)

Faut-il condamner le dopage génétique ? (French, Translated by Bérengère Viennot)

Ist „Gendoping“ verwerflich? (German, Translated by Anke Püttmann)

Je „genetický doping“ nesprávný? (Czech, Translated by Jiří Kobělka)

“基因兴奋剂”错了吗？ (Chinese, Translated by 许彬彬)

هل "تنشيط الجينات" خطأ؟ (Arabic, Translated by Ibrahim M. Ali

SportsGeneTest.com and ACTN3

I have just returned from Belgrade, where I presented a paper in an invited symposium at the 10th European College of Sport Science meeting. The title of the paper was 'Ban Drugs, Permit Gene Transfer'. Upon my return, I was updating the GMathletes website and discovered the SportsGeneTest website.


To my knowledge, this is the first site to indicate commercial tests for athletic performance. I noticed they have a policy statement, but it is only in German. If anyone can read German, perhaps you would tell me if it is an interesting statement or not!

More information is available through the Australian site 'Genetic Technologies'. In fact, at this page, the 'ethical tell' is a little clearer from their advice for coaches. I quote:

"It is important to note:

• this test is primarily aimed at elite athletes, serious competitors and teenagers already involved in sport and considering the next steps in terms of professional sports development;
• this test provides a complementary insight into a person's natural sport gearing and should only be considered as one aspect of a range of elements that go into being a champion, such as determination and the desire to win, enjoyment of the sport, coaching, nutrition, ability and level of fitness;
• the test may only be beneficial for those children already involved in and enjoying their sport who desire some direction as to their optimum sport or event if considering sport as a career or serious hobby;
• Genetic Technologies does not recommend or condone using the results of this test to pressure children into any sport or event. Children should only participate in sports that they enjoy for the purpose of fun and exercise."

So, it would seem they are concerned about:

1. These tests being used too early in a competitors life. Perhaps parents might wish to try them on their kids first, as a means of deciding whether it is worthwhile for them to play sport.
2. Genetic determinism - coaches/parents might conclude that the test result is the dominant predictor of performance capacity.
3. Tests might be imposed upon (young) athletes - though notably, they do not demonstrate a concern for adults being tested.

Well, I cover some of these issues in GMA, so perhaps no need to go over old ground. Still, genetic testing has yet to really hit home in the world of sport. It seems to be seen as merely an extension of talent identification, though I am not convinced that the principles are the same.

More on Genetic Tests for Performance

A few months ago, I posted on the use of genetic tests in the AFL. Since my very first talk about genomics and sport in 1999 at the First International Conference on Human Rights and Sport, I have been arguing on this subject. In 2003, the Australian Law Reforms Commission wrote about the potential for discrimination arising from genetic tests in sport.

This issue has arisen again in the context of the Australian Football League. Reports indicate that Port Adelaide and Essendon are considering the use of genetic tests to 'predict' the capacity of 'natural physical attributes'. The Age (Sydney) reported that each test would cost around AU$750 and AFL Players' Association president, Brendon Gale, has argued that such tests would be contrary to privacy laws in Australia. This issues seems about to, ahem, 'kick off' in Australia and few other countries have yet to really think it through.

Certainly, employment law might be a reasonable avenue for action within the UK, though where this takes place with young athletes, it seems likely to fall within the realm of parental consent.

Some of this relates to a piece I published a few years ago on this subject:

Miah, A. (2001) Genetics, Law & Athletes' Rights, Sports Law Bulletin 4(5), pp.10-12
Available here: http://www.media.paisley.ac.uk/andymiah/Miah2001GeneTest.pdf

Cosmetic Surgery & Wings

Next week, I will give a paper in Sweden titled 'Designer Steroids, Cosmetic Surgery, & Wings'. The paper will explore a range of modifications and, for now, I am particularly intrigued by the use of surgery for sport performance. So far, I have spoken to a range of doping experts about this and, each time, they are perplexed. The first responses is 'Well, what kind of surgery would an athlete benefit from?'. A couple of weeks ago, I posted something about Tiger Woods and laser-eye surgery, but I am sure there are other examples worth thinking through. So, until I have an answer about this one, I thought I'd through it out there and ask 'Why don't athletes use elective cosmetic surgery to enhance their performance?'

By the way, I will also mention that such modification is NOT banned by the World Anti-Doping Agency and I doubt that it could be.

(Maybe this relates a little to a paper I published a couple of years ago: Be Very Afraid: Cyborg Athletes, Transhuman Ideals & Posthumanity, Journal of Evolution & Technology, 2003)

Sport, medicine, ethics, Sweden

Sport Medicine Ethics, 23-24 May, 2005
On Monday 23rd and Tuesday 24th of May 2005, the Stockholm Center for Bioethics, together with the Department of Philosophy at the University of Stockholm and the Oxford Centre for Applied Ethics will organize an international conference on sport medicine ethics, an area still undiscussed within the field of bioethics.

The conference site is Stockholm, and the title of the conference is

"Legitimate and illegitimate enhancements, where to draw the line?".

further details will be posted at the website of the Forum for the Analysis of Sport Technology