Performance-Enhancing Drugs are Taking over Sports The article “Doping in Sports: Steroids and Supplements” says “The word dope comes from the Dutch word dop, which is an alcoholic beverage made from grape skins that the Zulu warriors would think it could enhance their fighting ability. ” (World Almanac and Book of Facts’ n. pag. ). Unfortunately, they were wrong because when there was a fight between the athletes, one drank it and the other one didn’t, it ended up that the athlete that did not drink it had more strength over the other.
Obviously, now athletes take performance-enhancing drugs, that they take before a workout so it would help athletes to get bigger, faster, and stronger. Using Performance-Enhancing Drugs is not beneficial for athletes because of the people that are getting caught by using PED’s, people proposing new ideas of testing that will help make catching athletes easier, and the short and long term effects of using these drugs. Performance-Enhancing Drugs will not help keep your personal record clean from getting caught while using.
For instance, many organizations are using tests to find athletes that may have used PEDs in the past or are still using them to this day. According to Robertson, “The focus for WADA is to build partnerships between sports movements and public authority that will allow anti-doping organizations to search and seize, survey, and legally conduct compulsory witness testimonies under penalties of perjury” (n. pag. ). Many organizations, including WADA, are wanting to catch athletes that have been using PEDs so that they can restore sports back to their original form without the use of drugs.
In addition, athletes will be tested by more sophisticated ways that will be able to catch who is using these drugs. According to Robertson, “More and more athletes will get caught in 2014 by league investigations because cheats eventually lose and methods of catching cheats will be more sophisticated” (n. pag. ). There are many ways of testing that will be coming out in the future that will make catching cheats easier for investigators, and the cheats will have to deal with what happens to them. For example the athletes that cheat will have consequences from what they have done.
According to Steadman, “Dwain Chambers… UK’s fastest sprinter in the 100m race, was banned for competing in the Olympic games after testing positive for the anabolic steroid tetrahydrogestrinone… and he claimed… that at least half of the US racing team… were using illegal substances” (n. pag. ). There are many athletes now that use PEDs to be the best even though they cannot because to be the best at what you do, you have to be your best self. With the rules they have now for using PEDs, there is a much worse punishment that can happen now than when it was first realized what was happening in these sports.
According to Draper, “Pound also hits out at sports federations that issue two-year bans for serious doping offences, when they already have the option to impose a four-year ban, claiming that the federations do so to protect doped athletes” (n. pag. ). It is not fair that they get to be bigger, faster, and better than everyone else that do not take PEDs, and they should have consequences for whoever does not play fair. People never think that they will get caught from using PEDs, but eventually they will and everything they have accomplished will be ruined.
There are many new ideas of testing that are coming out to test for Performance-Enhancing Drugs that will be able to catch every athlete that uses them. They test athletes before they come into the sport and in the Olympics, that way everyone will know when an athlete gets caught from using. According to “Performance-Enhancing Drugs are Dangerous”, “Only more recently have governed bodies-namely the World Anti-Doping Agency… which tests international contests such as London’s 2012 Olympics-attempted to test for and regulate their use… and abuse” (n. pag. ).
Many people are starting to use PED’s and abusing them, now that they have tested they are going to get caught because of the mistake they made. In addition, they will not stop until they find a way that is 100% accurate. According to Robertson, “More recently there have been calls for “blood passports” in tennis, which would measure the history of an athlete’s levels of substances over a period of time” (n. pag. ). The new ideas of testing can track long or short term drug abuse, you would have to be intelligent to come up with a way to get past their testing.
Because of what athletes do to be better than other athletes, now organizations have to test athletes for the use of PEDs. According to Robertson, “With world anti-doping organizations at the helm left to figure out the future methods of advanced blood testing and eradicating cheats from sport, they must unearth what fans really want from sport” (n. pag. ). Soon enough they will be able to catch anyone that is using PED’s, and if you don’t stop using them you might as well say goodbye to the sport that you love.
When athletes become better than the best athletes, organizations start to assume, but they are not always correct, so this is where drug testing comes in to help, organizations have a way to figure out if they use or not. According to Rosenberg, “That is why sports need performance-enhancing drug testing. If you get rid of the testing, you punish those who are right so you can forgive those who are wrong” (n. pag. ). If they get rid of performance-enhancing drug testing everybody would start doing it and that is not what the world wants for their sports.
In the future, organizations will be able to find out whether the athletes have used PEDs to know whether they should not be a part of sports again. If everyone that uses Performance-Enhancing Drugs knew what would happen from using in the future, would they still choose to use them. For example, their are many long and short term effects that may change your life for the worse. According to William Mitchell, an orthopedic surgeon says, “Doping increases health risks when doses and amounts of hormonal use is not regulated and can lead to overdosing and catastrophic health risks including death” (qtd. n PerformanceEnhancing Drugs are Dangerous n. pag. ).
If people knew what could happen to them, would they still put their life on the line to be bigger, stronger, and faster than everybody else. In addition, they have short term effects which are physical features, but the long terms out way the short terms with effects that can kill you. According to Steadman, “Anabolic steroids… have adverse side effects which range from acne, infertility, and impotence to hypertension… psychosis and cardiovascular disease” (n. pag. ).
Many of the different performance-enhancing drugs can have lines and lines of side effects for using, and it would not be fun to have one of the worst possible side effects happen. Even though many people know about what PEDs can do to them and the rest of their lives, they have a choice, a choice to live and not use PEDs, or to use them and suffer. According to “Performance-EnhancingDrugs are Dangerous” it says, “But, it has been implicated in the death of at least 18 cyclists during alleged heavy use in the 1990s” (n. pag. ). There has been so many deaths from taking PED’s that who would ever want to use them.
People don’t know what they are getting themselves into. In addition to saving their lives, many people that use are making it hard for their heart to work properly and can also cause damage. According to the article “Performance-Enhancing Drugs are Dangerous”, “Topping the list is cardiomyopathy, an enlargement and thickening of muscles in the heart that weakens heart function over time. HGH can also impair glucose regulation, leading to type 2 diabetes” (n. pag. ). There are many side effects that do not just happen and go away, many of the side effects can be with you for the rest of your life and may even kill you.
Many people in the world like to watch sports and they can not bear to see what happens when using PEDs, because when people hear that their favorite player has died they want to stop what is happening in the sports. The many reasons not to take PEDs are the athletes that are getting caught, the new ideas of testing from many organizations, and the long and short term effects of using PEDs. The athletes that get caught from using when they think they will not get caught. Also the new ideas of testing are helping to catch more and more athletes that may be using PEDs.
Lastly the short and long term effects that happen when using can cause athletes to feel different in every way possible. When the Zulu warriors took a drink they would feel different, and now that can happen more and more in the future, because of the new ideas of Performance-Enhancing Drugs that are coming out that say that they are new and better than ever, but instead of being new and better they are just as bad for athletes. Athletes are adored every day from the records and fame that they receive, but all it comes down to for athletes is to be the best, and performance-enhancing drugs are not being the athletes best self.
