Decision on national swimmers based on global sporting benchmarks, Singapore's stance on drug use: SportSG

SINGAPORE: Sport Singapore (SportSG) on Friday (Oct 7) said that the disciplinary action it took against national swimmers Joseph Schooling, Amanda Lim and Teong Tzen Wei was based on international sporting benchmarks, Singapore's stance towards drug use and agreements signed between the trio and SportSG.

On Sep 28, SportSG said that it would suspend all support for them for a month after they confessed to consuming controlled drugs overseas.

"There has been some public discussion regarding the disciplinary actions SportSG has taken against the three athletes – Joseph Schooling, Amanda Lim and Teong Tzen Wei," it said in a statement.

"SportSG's decision to suspend support for the athletes for a period of one month was made after an internal review, taking into account the athletes' breach of the terms of the agreement signed between the athletes and SportSG, international sporting benchmarks and Singapore's stance towards drug abuse."

These benchmarks included those of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and national federations.

"In particular, WADA does not impose any sanctions for the ingestion or use of the following controlled drugs - cannabis, cocaine, heroin, ecstasy - if it is ingested/used outside of the competition period," SportSG said.

"If the athlete tests positive for these drugs in-competition but can show that they have no relation to their competition performance, the athlete would face a one- to three-month suspension.

"A one-month suspension would apply if the athlete completes a drug rehabilitation programme."

SportSG's decision on the swimmers took into consideration that their urine tests returned negative results, and that they had, on their own, admitted to consuming cannabis outside of competition in the