The Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) wants to be transparent. Still suspended by WADA, while six months will soon have passed since the end of her two-year sanction, she has gotten into the habit of revealing the results of her controls. Problem: the numbers are on the rise. For the month of May 2023, RUSADA recorded 21 alleged violations of anti-doping regulations by Russian athletes. She counted 10 in January, 25 in February, 13 in March and 16 in April. For the year 2022, where the vast majority of Russian athletes were excluded from international competitions from March due to the conflict in Ukraine, RUSADA said it had identified 135 potential anti-doping rule violations. According to its general director, Veronika Loginova, almost a quarter of the doping cases concerned meldonium, a drug very common in Eastern European countries, banned since January 2016.
