COLORADO SPRINGS, CO – The Partnership for Clean Competition (PCC) funds more than 70% of the world’s anti-doping research, but with the current global pandemic, the non-profit will make funds available to one of its most frequent collaborators for critical COVID-19 research. The project will provide community testing and results for 15,000 people in highly-affected areas of the United States.

The Sports Medicine Research and Testing Laboratory (SMRTL) in Salt Lake City, Utah will partner with the University of Southern California, Stanford University, and local boards of health to conduct the community testing for COVID-19.

“We work with some of the most advanced labs in the world,” said PCC Executive Director Michael Pearlmutter, “so we knew we already had exceptional partners to help fight this pandemic. COVID-19 demands all of our best efforts, and we’re proud to contribute to this global fight.”

SMRTL, a lab accredited by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), will leverage its expertise and contacts to conduct 15,000 FDA-approved COVID-19 tests across the general public and employees of athletic organizations, who will participate to ensure enough samples can be collected at the same time. The research will use point-of-care tests to give quick, accurate results for people in various locations throughout the country.

Dr. Daniel Eichner, President of SMRTL, explained, “The study will reveal the prevalence of COVID-19 infections. Importantly, the data will also determine how many people have been infected and recovered.  Based on our observations of other outbreaks, many carriers don’t have a clinical reason to get tested, so they go undetected and may continue to put others at risk of infection.”

Professor Jay Bhattacharya of Stanford said, “The most important numbers to design good policy to deal with an epidemic are the number of people who are infected and who have been infected, but we do not know either number. The infrastructure we are building will provide the first population representative estimates of COVID-19 prevalence in the US. The results from the study will help public health authorities predict where the epidemic is most likely to flare up next, where resources should be diverted to best meet the needs of patients infected with COVID-19, and when it is safe to resume normal activity.”

Professor Neeraj Sood of University of Southern California added, “This study will provide critical information on the spread of COVID-19 in the US and its impact on deaths and hospitalizations. The study is needed so that policy decisions can be based on evidence about the risk of COVID-19 rather than fear about its potential effects.”

The Partnership for Clean Competition will fund the test kits themselves for a total of $120,000.

The testing will be conducted in early April.

About the Partnership for Clean Competition

The Partnership for Clean Competition is an innovative research collaborative founded in 2008 as a 501(c)(3) non-profit public charity by the United States Olympic Committee, United States Anti-Doping Agency, Major League Baseball and the National Football League. Every day, the PCC acts to protect the integrity of sport and public health by engaging and supporting the world’s top scientists and innovators in high-quality anti-doping research and development. The PCC also facilitates adoption of these methods into the World Anti-Doping Agency-accredited laboratories. The PCC aspires to help generate the world’s most influential, effective and coveted methods and resources for detecting and deterring the use of performance enhancing substances by all athletes in all sports at all levels. Through this work, the PCC demonstrates the value of science, collaboration and innovation related to doping control in sport and ensures the benefits of sport participation. For more information, visit CleanCompetition.org.

Media Contact

To learn more, email Communications Director David Kumbroch at dkumbroch@cleancompetition.org.