SPORTS-ARGENTINA: Maradona to Undergo Drug Treatment

By Marcela Valente Reprint | | Print |

Marcela Valente

BUENOS AIRES, Jan 6 2000 (IPS) - Retired Argentine football legend Diego Maradona continued to recover Thursday in a Uruguayan hospital, while the justice system investigated the origin of the cocaine that caused his bout with high blood pressure Tuesday, and his friends and family decided whether to commit him to a treatment centre.

“The patient is evolving as expected, and today will be transferred to intermediate care” (from the intensive care unit), reported Dr. Frank Torres at the Cantegril clinic in the city of Maldonado in Uruguay.

Since New Year’s Eve, Maradona, the captain and star of the Argentine team that won the World Cup in 1986, was vacationing with his family in the exclusive Uruguayan resort town of Punta del Este, on the coast near the city of Maldonado, and had granted interviews to magazines, newspapers and radio stations.

In December, Maradona, one of the world’s all-time football legends, was named sportsman of the century in Argentina – an honour questioned by many journalists and others due to his use of drugs.

Torres added that Maradona’s family and associates were considering committing the 39-year-old former footballer to a rehabilitation centre to treat “the underlying problem” – his addiction to drugs.

Although the doctors who treated Maradona reported that he was admitted Tuesday for hypertension with arrythmia, rumours about a cocaine overdose spread like wildfire, and were finally confirmed by Maldonado police chief Máximo Costa Rocha.

The bout with hypertension, a problem Maradona suffers from, could have been caused by the fact that he is overweight, by excess consumption of salt, or by stress. But according to Costa Rocha, it was caused by “excessive” consumption of cocaine.

He added that given the state in which the patient was brought to the clinic, “without a doubt it was an overdose.”

“Those of us familiar with forensic medicine know that hypertension is one of the natural consequences of the excessive consumption of drugs,” Costa Rocha said Thursday.

The Uruguayan justice system decided to investigate whether the high blood pressure was caused by the use of drugs, which is not a criminal offence in Uruguay.

The aim of the Maldonado police and courts was to confirm the rumours of an overdose in order to investigate who provided the former football player with illegal drugs, which is a specific crime covered by Uruguay’s penal code.

Forensic experts were asked to take samples of the patient’s blood and urine, and the urine was found to contain traces of cocaine and amphetamines.

And on the condition of anonymity, doctors at the Cantegril clinic told the press that Maradona, unconscious, was brought into the clinic by his friend and agent Guillermo Cóppola, and found to be suffering from tachycardia, sensorial depression and confusion.

Once the results of the analyses were known, Cóppola and another of Maradona’s friends were called on to make statements before the Uruguayan police and Judge Alicia dos Santos.

Cóppola said he told authorities about Maradona’s activities in the last few days, and said he was surprised by the results of the exams. “Diego never denied having this little problem, but I’m surprised” anyway, he said.

Maradona will also have to make a statement – but will not face legal charges – once he has fully recovered.

The former Number 10, whose name is the first thing that comes to mind for many people around the world when they think about Argentina, confessed his addiction to cocaine in 1996 in an interview with an Argentine magazine. But as early as 1991, a urine exam tested positive. According to Maradona, he first tried the drug in 1982.