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Musburger: Steroids misunderstood by media

Discussion in 'Sports and News' started by HanSenSE, Oct 7, 2010.

  1. cranberry

    cranberry Well-Known Member

    But, again, all of these side effects depend greatly on the type of substance being taken and the dosage level. Alcohol causes liver damage, too, yet many of us continue to use it moderately with little risk. If you're going to use livestock-grade steroids at massive levels well, yeah, that's going to be a problem. But if you've got a responsible physician administering the most suitable types at moderate levels, that's not likely to trigger any major long-term side effect.
     
  2. Mizzougrad96

    Mizzougrad96 Active Member

    It's really true. Most of the guys using don't do it at a level of an Alzado or a Canseco. If you do it, under a doctor's supervision, for a couple years, the chances of long term effects are probably minimal.
     
  3. outofplace

    outofplace Well-Known Member

    Probably doesn't cut it. The simple truth we really don't know the long-term effects of most of the drugs being used today, but athletes are more than happy to take the risks. Even if major studies were done into possible brain damage caused by performance enhancers, athletes are still going to break the rules and take the risk.
     
  4. Boom_70

    Boom_70 Well-Known Member

    What the smart athletes do is take HGH that will still keep their Testosterone in a normal but high range. Their can be a 50 % differential in what can be defined as normal.
     
  5. dooley_womack1

    dooley_womack1 Well-Known Member

    Once it was "off the record," he couldn't report it. Now, if he wrote a story talking about how the guy stepped up his workout regimen to gain 20 pounds of muscle, that would be unethical
     
  6. Mizzougrad96

    Mizzougrad96 Active Member

    That was the story everybody else wrote. I just stayed away from it. I know for a fact one of the guys who wrote that story knew the truth.
     
  7. DocTalk

    DocTalk Active Member

    My stance has always been anti-performance enhancing drugs. Use by professional athletes signals to college athletes that PEDs are needed to succeed at the next level. That in turn can trickle down to the high school and middle school levels. Studies have suggested that 1-3 % of middle school kids have used some sort of performance enhancing drug.

    There are very real consequences and complications of HGH use. In patients who have had previous cancers, there is an increased risk of a second tumor (often involving the brain). The risk of diabetes and glucose intolerance increases as does the risks for hypothyroidism and pancreatitis. In kids who have not finished growing, a rapid growth spurt caused by HGH can cause progression of scoliosis or a slipped capital femoral epiphysis, where the growth plate of the ball of the hip joint fails.

    These are reasonable risks when the drug is being used for medical necessity, children with growth hormone deficiency, Turners Syndrome and the like. But using it, in effect, for cosmetic reaosns makes the risks outweigh the rewards, especially if societal cost is included.

    There is another issue that i have with Mr. Musberger. I am uncertain when a member of the press can use their position to influence the public on matters where they are not expert. Jenny McCarthy's fame and her erroneous stance on the relationship between immunizations and autism may have diminished generations of developing herd immunity to killer childhood diseases. I wish that he would stick to being a reporter and not a newsmaker.
     
  8. Boom_70

    Boom_70 Well-Known Member

    But the problem with that stance is that kids are being told that PEDs don't work but yet they see the results. They then feel they are being lied to.

    Wouldn't it be better to have an honest intellectual discussion along the lines of "yes they work but these are the dangers" .

    I've seen 2 instances of kids who would have been described as 'sickly" during their elementary years and were prescribed steroids under Dr's care. Now they are both monsters tearing up the football field. How do you explain that to the other kids?
     
  9. DocTalk

    DocTalk Active Member

    There are specific indications for the use of HGH in children and I presume that the two 'sickly" kids were appropriately prescribed the medications.

    How do you explain the situation where a child develops diabetes and with the use of insulin is able to return his full potential? What about EPO used ot increase red blood cell production in a person with kidney disease? The ability to make a patient whole differs from the ability to enhance performance. If that whole person becomes an athlete who excels, it does not grant license to use a medication for a purpose not intended.
     
  10. Boom_70

    Boom_70 Well-Known Member

    I too would presume they were appropriately prescribed also but also presume that both sets of parents asked the doctor to push the envelope. Both kids were made whole and them some.
    It then becomes a question of fairness to the other kids. Being close enough to situation I've heard more than one parent grumble about the situation. Mistake parents of Steroid boys made is telling everyone.
     
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