Tennis Player Simona Halep Suspended for Anti-Doping Violations

The International Tennis Integrity Agency (ITIA) issued a statement confirming that Romanian tennis player, Simona Halep has been suspended for four years on account of two breaches of the Tennis Anti-Doping Programme (TADP).

The first breach was pertaining to the presence of Roxodustat (which is part of the WADA prohibited list) in the testing sample collected at the US Open in August 2022 and the second was regarding irregularities in her Athlete Biological Passport (ABP).

In its decision dated September 11, 2023, the Independent Tribunal, set up by Sport Resolutions, accepted the unanimous “strong opinion” of the Expert Panel that the player’s explanations could not account for the abnormalities in her ABP profile and ruled against Halep, holding her to be in breach of Articles 2.1 and 2.2 of the TADP. With this, a four-year period of ineligibility was imposed on Halep, from October 7, 2022 (i.e., the date of provisional suspension), to October 6, 2026. In accordance with the TADP, all of her results obtained in competitions between August 29, 2022, and October 7, 2022, have been disqualified, with forfeiture of any medals, titles, ranking points and prize money. She has a right to exclusively appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport in Switzerland in accordance with TADP Article 13.