Posts Tagged positive drug test

Tour de France Winner Alberto Contador Disputes Drug Test Results

Posted by Drug Free in Drug Testing on October 1st, 2010

Spanish cyclist Alberto Contador, who won the 2010 Tour de France, has tested positive for clenbuterol, a banned substance. The substance, according to a report on The Christian Science Monitor, showed up in his urine sample from July 21, four days before the end of Tour de France.

Alberto ContadorShould the International Cycling Union (UCI) and the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) find that Contador knowingly took the drug, he may lose his title.

Contador, however, has denied the allegations. He is blaming the existence of the substance in his urine sample to contaminated meat, and revealed that he may have unknowingly ingested the drug through a steak that a friend had brought to France during the race. It is a known fact that clenbuterol and its ability to increase muscle-to-body fat ratio is used illegally in cattle in order to obtain leaner meats. The amount of clenbuterol found in Contador’s sample is 50 picograms (5 x 10-11 grams), which is one four-hundredth of the threshold that is detectable by an accredited laboratory.

The CS Monitor feature shared that the cyclist and triple Tour winner was very emotional during the press conference in his hometown of Pinto, Spain, after the drug test results were made public.

Contador told the press: “I’m the victim… I could have written a script, but my script is the truth. I trust that [regulating bodies] will confirm this case. I understand that it is not easy for them because it questions their rules.”

An investigation is currently under way.

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Dirty Money: Traces of Cocaine on 90% of US Dollar Bills

Posted by DrugFreeHomes in Drug Abuse Treatment, Drug Facts, Drug Testing on August 25th, 2009

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The next time you deal with paper currency, be aware of the fact that a large percentage of U.S. bills contain traits of cocaine. Yuegang Zuo, a professor at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth, conducted a research which revealed that 90% of the bills circulated in the U.S. are contaminated with cocaine.

This startling information is a confirmation of the findings of previous studies on the issue. In 1985 the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration study showed that a third to a half of all the randomly tested currency in a Federal District Bank had traces of cocaine. In another study, more than 135 bills were tested in seven cities of the country and all except four, were contaminated. Cocaine binds in the green dye in the bill.

Zuo said that the contamination was 100% in cities like Detroit, Boston, Orlando and Los Angeles, 85% in Toronto, 77% in Salt Lake City, Utah, 75% in Brasilia and 20% in Tokyo and Beijing. He also found that $5, $10, $20 and $50 had greater chances of contamination. 

The quantity of contamination could vary between a nanogram (one-billionth of a gram) to milligram. Thus it actually does not pose any health risk. But those who have to handle an extremely large number of bills everyday – in bank tellers or soft rooms of casinos- repeatedly inhale cocaine involuntarily and has a chance of being positive on a drug test report.

Money gets contaminated if a cocaine user snorts with it and also during drug deals. But not all money gets infected that way. In powdered form cocaine is extremely fine. So when a dirty bill is processed or sorted through the machines, traces of the drug are easily passed on to the other bills in the same batch. Thus bills also get infected through ATMs, counting machines in banks and casinos. Whatever be it, the fact remains that the initial contamination was through the drug users and dealers.

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