World Dance Council agrees anti-doping programme

Posted on June 28, 2011

After negotiations with the World Anti Doping Agency (WADA), the World Dance Council has agreed an anti-doping programme for those involved in competitive dance.

The new programme is based on WADA anti-doping rules, which will become part of the constitution of the World Dance Council and the competition rules of the WDC Amateur League.

In a press release, the World Dance Council announced that “The WDC has long and indisputably supported the principle and ethics of the Agency. Doping in any form has not been acceptable in competitive activities for the WDC and WDC AL and especially not when ballroom dancing as a competitive discipline was concerned. The position, the values, the ethics of the WDC have been reiterated many times over and to all bodies involved in dance.

“The World Dance Council are pleased to announce that they have now completed formal negotiations with the WADA and all those now involved in the competitive discipline of dance will in the future be subject to the limitations and requirements of the programme agreed with the WADA.”

In recent years, anti-doping rules have been a point of disagreement between the WDC and the International Dancesport Federation (IDSF), which subscribed to the World Anti Doping Code in 2001.

Zoe Anderson

Zoë was born in Edinburgh, and saw her first dance performances at the Festival there. She is the dance critic of The Independent, and has also written for The Independent on Sunday, The Scotsman and Dancing Times. In 2002, she received her doctorate from the University of York for a thesis on “Nationhood and epic romance: Ariosto, Sidney, Spenser”. She is the author of The Royal Ballet: 75 Years and The Ballet Lover’s Companion.