It is true that some athletes inject ozone into their blood to improve their performance, but that does not give them any kind of miraculous contribution, according to the studies. It is also true that the athlete can be punished by injecting ozone, but not by the introduction of the product into the body, but by blood extraction and reinjection. In other words, ozone itself is not a doping product, blood self-transfusion is an illegal action.

Cyclist Di Gregorio was arrested by the Police on the Tour de France 2010. He injected ozone into the blood, the famous gas that protects the earth from ultraviolet radiation. Blood extraction, mixing with ozone and reintroduction. Easy. But it's very difficult to detect, because the effects disappear quickly. “People who inject the EPO look the same, increasing the number of red blood cells, but the effects disappear for two or three months,” said in La Vanguardia the director of the anti-doping laboratory in Barcelona, Jordi Segura. In his words, ozone (O3) becomes oxygen (O2) and multiplies in the blood, favoring a better oxygenation of the muscles. Ozone does not increase the number of red blood cells. Segura says that ozone detection techniques are not improved and that to capture the athlete it is necessary to have “an indirect pathway” (a whiff). Di Gregorio was denounced by a naturopath. The condemned man acknowledged in 2008 that he had carried out blood transfusions to four cyclists who were on the street because of the illegal activity of medicine.

Researcher Moses García states that ozone injection is useless: “I understand doping some sportsmen, but using the sasitherapy that is useless... Ozone is useless and dangerous because the oxidant power of ozone affects red blood cells.” Only the ozone injection to Di Gregorio has served to drive him out of the Tour.

Prosecutor Jackes Dallet said that “we are not talking about a doping product, but doping methods.” He stressed that ozone does not dopa, but has defined auto-transfusion as a “doping method”. “The naturopath who administered ozone will be charged for supplying a banned substance to an athlete and for the illegal activity of medicine,” says the researcher: “Managing ozone is not medicine, it is dangerous stupidity.”

It also has a message for La Vanguardia, who has presented this “nonsense” as the new god of doping: “No wonder it is said that it cannot be detected because it does nothing. The news has succeeded in convincing people that it actually works. But I don't understand why the International Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) loses time and money by detecting something that it doesn't favor. Will Bach flowers also be included among doping themes?”

They may not work at all, but it is no wonder that more and more people are injecting ozone to improve sports performance, given the treatment given by the media.