AMERICA'S most prominent wrestling writer has labelled the WWE's drug testing programme "more fishy than even the most sceptical would have believed".
Dave Meltzer claims that when the federation designed their Wellness Policy in February 2006 it contained a serious loophole that allowed wrestlers to continue using a "well-known" method of obtaining steroids for faked testosterone replacement therapy.
In this week's Wrestling Observer Newsletter he quotes an unnamed ex-WWE employee who regularly bought drugs from Signature Pharmacy, the same firm revealed last week as supplying many grapplers with steroids and growth hormone over the Internet.
Meltzer writes: "He told us he had been getting steroids from Signature in 2005 and that everyone everybody in the company did it.
"He said they would not supply steroids without just medical cause, because of their controlled legal nature.
"He said the routine (among wrestlers) was to get on a heavy steroid cycle, then get off and not take any HCG, which kicks your natural testosterone back in.
"Two weeks later, when the testosterone boost from the steroids is gone, but before your natural level of testosterone has kicked back in, you get a blood test.
"Even if you are in your early 20s, you will be diagnosed with significantly low levels of testosterone.
"What's the medical treatment? Testosterone therapy.
"Basically, you get a lifetime prescription, if you want to keep using it.
"The point of all of this is when David Black designed the WWE's unique steroid policy, as the only sports testing programme we're aware of that allows the testosterone replacement exemption, the policy specifically allowed the well-known method wrestlers were already using to defraud the system.
"This is not a system the wrestlers came up with after the policy was enacted, but the system already in place by the wrestlers."
Meanwhile there has been a mixed reaction to the WWE's decision to suspend at least 10 superstars accused of using Signature Pharmacy.
While Meltzer notes they took more than two weeks to act and that Randy Orton is still set to headline the next big PPV, two other vocal critics have been more welcoming.
Marc Mero told The Sun: "The suspensions are a move in the right direction to address the drug problem in pro wrestling.
"I wish it didn't have to take so many of our brothers and sisters to die so young.
"I can only hope that these wrestlers that are suspended turn their bad choices into a positive platform to help young people that idolize them."
Lance Storm added: "While these suspensions did expose that WWE's Wellness Policy was either extremely flawed, or poorly enforced, perhaps even both, they also showed that WWE is being put in a position where things are having to be done and they are at least being done.
"With a three-strike rule still in effect, and WWE announcing that names of talent failing Wellness and facing suspensions will be publicly released as of November 1, there is going to be a lot more pressure on talent and WWE to clean up.
"Even if talent can circumnavigate Wellness, fear of exposure through other investigations into doctors and suppliers, should make everyone rethink the risk of steroid and drug use.
"We are still a long way from prefect but, by hook or by crook, these suspensions happened and are a small step in the right direction." | 
