The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) has withdrawn its defamation lawsuit against the United States Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) following a dispute over Chinese swimmers who tested positive for a banned substance in 2021.
WADA had cleared 23 Chinese swimmers to compete at the Tokyo Olympics after determining it could not disprove the China Anti-Doping Agency’s (CHINADA) conclusion that their positive tests for the heart medication trimetazidine (TMZ) resulted from contamination.
USADA chief executive Travis Tygart accused WADA of covering up the incident—an allegation WADA dismissed as “completely false and defamatory” before filing a defamation lawsuit in a Swiss court against USADA and Tygart.
While WADA insists the lawsuit would have been successful, it announced its decision to withdraw the case in the “interest of moving on.”
Tygart, in response, called the lawsuit “baseless” and said WADA’s decision to drop it was “complete vindication” for both himself and USADA.