Should we allow performance-enhancing drugs in sports?.
"Only the most nave sports fan can be shocked-shocked!-that drugs and athletics go together like socks and sweats.""(Sharon Begley and Martha Brant: The real Scandal in International Sport: Doping 181). How nave are we as sport fans? Do we really think performance-enhancing drugs belong to sports? As there are a lot different methods of doping in sports; I am going to focus only on anabolic steroids, in my essay. Dealing with that issue it is important to find out how steroids work, how they are used and what the side effects are.
I will use the term "anabolic steroids" through-out this essay because of its familiarity, although the proper term for these compounds is anabolic-androgenic' steroids. The web page of the National Institute on Drug Abuse was the source of my knowledge concerning anabolic steroids, I used the provide information and paraphrased it to make it more understandable. The National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) web page is part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), a component of the U.S.Department of Health and Human Services. "'Anabolic steroids' is the familiar name for synthetic substances related to the male sex hormones (androgens). They promote the growth of skeletal muscle (anabolic effects) and the development of male sexual characteristics (androgenic effects), and also have some other effects."" (N.I.D.A. what par 1) Taking steroids in connection of hard work out starts muscle growth, work out or not, the development of the male sexual characteristics are influenced, too. In the late 1930s, Anabolic steroids were developed to treat hypogonadism, a condition in which the testes do not produce sufficient testosterone for normal growth, development, and sexual functioning. Scientists at that time discovered that anabolic steroids could facilitate the growth of skeletal muscle in laboratory animals.
