Jaundice at NIS: Food or dope?

Dr H K Madan of the Patiala General Hospital, who attended to the athletes when they were admitted to the emergency ward there, said they had told him it was due to an overdose of cretaine, a health supplement, and testosterone.

Though cretaine is not a banned substance, testosterone is a proscribed anabolic steroid. Medical experts say jaundice and liver ailments are the first symptoms of steroid use.

Both athletes confirmed to this reporter the fact that they had been taking a heavy dose of cretaine, though they both denied using testosterone. ‘‘I’d been taking 10 grams of cretaine every day, double the dose prescribed’’, Ranjith said on Sunday.

Mathews concurred, adding: ‘‘The doctor (at the hospital) told me that overdose of cretaine is one of the reasons for the illness.’’

But the officials at the NIS reject this theory. ‘‘The athletes are suffering from hepatitis. Contaminated water and food is the reason, nothing else’’, said Dr Sarla, head of the NIS health centre.

Surprisingly, Ranjith and Mathews had been eating and drinking from the same hostel mess as other athletes and officials at the camp, yet no one else was affected.

Why did the athletes step up their cretaine intake? ‘‘I wasn’t recovering from heavy training loads. So I took more cretaine’’, said Ranjith, who won the gold at the Hyderabad nationals last November.

Chief national coach Bahadur Singh said the athletes hadn’t been training properly since they joined the camp in December. ‘‘I don’t know why they took a huge quantity of cretaine’’, he said.

Did he believe that caused the jaundice? ‘‘The medical staff is monitoring the report. I have no idea’’, he said.