Former UFC heavyweight champion, Junior dos Santos, failed an out-of-competition drug test taken on August 10th that pulled him out from his scheduled bout with Francis Ngannou at UFC 215 in September, but Anjos insisting that he did not intentionally cheat. The result came back positive for a banned substance diuretic called hydrochlorothiazide.
Well, he was right then. Now it turned out that the PED was detected in the sample due to the tainted supplement.
Today USADA (United States Anti-Doping Agency) released the statement stating the Brazilian pharmacy is the main culprit, as they sold the athletes tainted supplements. It turned out that two other Brazilian stars, Antonio Rogerio Nogueira and Marcos Rogerio de Lima were also fallen prey to those supplements which resulted in a positive drug test.
“We appreciate the cooperation of the athletes and international authorities in getting to the bottom of this situation, as it will hopefully prevent these problems from occurring in the future,” said Travis T. Tygart, CEO of USADA. “It’s unacceptable that these compounding pharmacies produced contaminated supplements for the public. And it’s another unfortunate example of why athletes must use extreme caution if using nutritional supplements.”
Even ESPN’s journalist confirmed the news:
UFC heavyweight Junior dos Santos is cleared to compete again, effective immediately. USADA has confirmed his failed drug test last August was caused by a contaminated supplement. He's accepted a six-month suspension, which is already over since the test was eight months ago.
— Brett Okamoto (@bokamotoESPN) April 23, 2018
All three fighters accepted reduced, a six-month suspension that ended upon the resolution of the case, that means they are cleared to return to Octagon.
Anjos last fought at UFC 211, where he suffered a first-round TKO loss to Stipe Miocic in a heavyweight title bout.
Nogueira’s doping violation also pulled him out from a proposed light heavyweight bout with Jared Cannonier at UFC on Fox 26 on Dec. 16; meanwhile, de Lima was removed from a 205-pound fight with Saparbek Safarov at UFC Fight Night 115 on Sept. 2.
