Regarding Bradley Wiggins:
Controversy around therapeutic use exemptions
The leaking of his personal medical history by a group of hackers called the
Fancy Bear, in September 2016, raised questions about Wiggins's use of
therapeutic use exemptions (TUEs), which allow athletes with certified medical conditions to take banned substances so as to allow them to compete with healthy athletes.
The leaked files show that he received six TUEs during his career for substances which are
otherwise banned by WADA. In 2008, he was granted TUEs for
salbutamol (which has since been legalised),
formoterol and
budesonide to treat asthma. Wiggins later received three intramuscular injections of the drug
triamcinolone, a powerful
corticosteroid. Triamcinolone is a banned substance because it allows riders to lose weight while maintaining power. The injections were administered to treat
hayfever shortly before the 2011 and 2012 Tour de France races, and the 2013 Giro d'Italia.
Whilst the use of banned performance-enhancing substances under TUEs is permitted by the sporting authorities provided the exemption was granted in terms of the WADA rules, questions have been raised about the in-competition use of such drugs. Dr Jeroen Swart questioned the choice of medication, the timing of the injections, the presence of disgraced doctor Geert Leinders on Wiggins's team at the time, and the fact that Wiggins said in his 2012 autobiography
My Time that he had only ever received injections for immunisations and some drips.
Prentice Steffen, who was team doctor at
Garmin–Slipstream when Wiggins rode for the team in 2009, said in a 2016 interview with the
BBC that he was "surprised" that Wiggins was granted TUEs for the injection of triamcinolone immediately before three Grand Tours, that the decision by the team to apply for these TUEs was "questionable", and that he felt they should not have been granted. Wiggins has denied that Geert Leinders had any direct involvement in his taking of the TUE drugs.
On 5 March 2018, the British House of Commons
Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee published their report called "Combatting doping in sport". Their inquiry spanned the work of two committees, and started in August 2015. Among other things, the committee looked into doping in cycling, in response to the Fancy Bear hacking into the database of
WADA and their publication of Therapeutic Use Exemption certificates (TUEs) issued to Bradley Wiggins in 2011, 2012 and 2013. They specifically inquired into the medication used at that time by Wiggins and Team Sky. In their conclusions, in paragraph 110, they state as follows:
The BBC called the report "A devastating blow to the reputations of some of the biggest names in British sport", and The Irish Times reported that Wiggins's Tour de France win is now in question. The Guardian wrote that: "It is only three months since we were last asking whether the latest crisis would signal the end for Team Sky. Now here we are again, wondering how much longer this organisation can continue when every scintilla of credibility they had as a completely clean team has been decimated by another inquiry."
Wiggins and Team Sky have continued to deny that any drugs were used without medical need.