From the afl website, these self righteous wankers will try to put a positive spin on anything. The 12 positive results are the lowest, there are the same number of players playing, so how many players have tested in previous years ?
The drug culture is rife indeed.
http://www.afl.com.au/news/newsarticle/tabid/208/newsid/77747/default.aspx
LESS than one per cent of illicit drug tests of AFL players yielded a positive result last year.
The results of the Illicit Drug Policy out of competition testing for 2008 showed that
12 of the 1220
drug tests last year came up positive.
Two of the 12 tested positive a second time.
The 0.98 per cent failure rate is the lowest since illicit drug testing out of competition was introduced in 2005.
AFL general manager of football operations Adrian Anderson said the results were proof that the various education programs and counselling were helping change player behaviour but said the ideal result was to have no positive results.
“The policy itself has been incredibly successful. Would we like to see a situation where there is no player taking illicit drugs? Absolutely. Is there room for improvement? We will continue to strive to do that,” Anderson said.
While disappointed with the 12 positive results, Anderson said it was a relatively miniscule number.
“When you compare it against society, this is an incredibly low number of people within the population the size of our player group to be taking illicit drugs,” he said.
“With just about any workplace in the country it would compare favourably. As a fact we know that these are remarkable numbers but of course we’d rather see it zero.”
There will be an increase on the number of tests to 1500 in 2009, with all AFL players to be tested at least once during the year. Holiday hair-testing has also been introduced for a two-year trial in 2009-10.
Three of the 12 tests were to cannabinoids, while eight were to stimulants. One was a mix.
Anderson said
confidentiality was treated with the utmost importance as only the player, AFL doctors and club medical officers would know the identities of the players that had tested positive.
“We decided after the start of the policy to involve the club medical officers, so that a person from the club, with expertise in the area is involved in dealing with the player. The AFL club doctors provide great input and support,” he said.
AFL Players Association CEO Brendon Gale said the results were impressive.
“Primarliy, we’re encouraged by these results. The players made a very brave and bold decision in 2005 to commit to this policy. In doing so, they were motivated by one thing and that was to protect the health and safety of players,” Gale said
