The Association of Professional Handball Players (AJPH) released an open letter on Sunday from six players from the Nantes handball club saying they did not know they had undergone a pregnancy test at the start of the season. Thursday, the AJPH had denounced "unacceptable practices", ensuring that these tests had been carried out "without the consent of the players".
After a club press conference
Friday, club president Arnaud Ponroy explained that the team doctor, specialist in maternity issues in high performance sport, had prescribed these tests last summer as part of the health check at the start of the season all players under contract, but in strict compliance with medical confidentiality. A dozen players were present at a press conference - out of a workforce of 14 professionals and eight young people in training - to show their confidence in this new doctor.
The latter added a dosage of the hormone Beta HCG, on the order of blood tests which the young women then went to make in a laboratory, apparently to verify that they could support the intense efforts of the preparation at the beginning of season, but without necessarily realizing that this test made it possible to detect a pregnancy. "We didn't all have the reflex to look at what was on our prescriptions," said captain Léa Lignières.
"Let an awareness take place"
In their open letter on Sunday, the six anonymous players explain that all the players present on Friday, and those who refused to attend the press conference, did not agree. "We, the signatories of this open letter, were not specifically informed that the biological tests that we went to do, included a blood pregnancy test," they write. "We don't want to attack anyone in particular. We also don't want the doctor we trust to lose his job," they add, explaining that they just wanted to be informed.
"By denouncing this practice, we hope that an awareness will be realized so that no other player, so that no other woman has to experience this again in the context of her work, that she be athletic or not ", they add. On Friday, the French Handball Federation (FFHB) and the Women's Handball League recalled that doctors were free to order the exams they deemed necessary. The two authorities have however announced that they are preparing a reminder to all club doctors on "the legal obligation to obtain an express, formal and prior agreement from the athletes to prescribe a beta HCG hormone dosage".