The Cons of PED
| Subject: | 🏥 Health Care |
| Type: | Informative Essay |
| Pages: | 3 |
| Word count: | 507 |
| Topics: | 💊 Substance Abuse, Health, Medicine |
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Introduction
The use of Performance Enhancement Drugs has been quite rampant. Different people utilise them as per their specific wants or needs. For instance, most muscle enthusiasts and bodybuilders use certain testosterone hormones or steroids to increase their muscles while sports people use PEDs to raise their performance standards. As such, the use of these drugs has both positive and negative effects on the people who use them. However, the demerits of using performance enhancement drugs outweigh the benefits. Thus, this paper will be concerned with these drawbacks. It is within this context that the paper will discuss the cons of PEDs on the users.
There are a variety of reasons that informs the use of performance enhancement drugs among athletes. As explained by Hodge et al (2013), the key reason why these athletes use PEDs is to enhancement their performance and thus increase their chances of winning in whichever sports they partake (Petroczi and Adman, 2008). This is among the few benefits of using performance enhancement drugs. Among the numerous demerit include, the resultant health effect on the users of the enhancement drugs in the long run. As explained by Smith et al (2010), some of the negative health effects among the users of PEDs include hypertension, high levels of cholesterol, irregular heartbeats, and severe depression. Additionally, PEDs give athletes an added advantage over their competitors, which makes the games in which they engage in meaningless and unfair. This is considered ethically wrong since for fair competition all the participants need to be at the same level. For this reason, performance enhancement drugs are currently highly discouraged in sporting competitions and could lead to the disqualification of the users.
As explained by Smith et al (2010) Performance Enhancements Drugs are known to cause premature balding or hair loss especially among teenagers. The drugs are also responsible for the growing cases of liver damage, which leads to jaundice reported among athletes and bodybuilders. Additionally, reliance on these drugs are also reported to lead to stunted growth in height, and are a major cause of acne. As such, the use of PEDs should be discouraged and completely banned (Hodge et al., 2013). Another clear depiction of the demerits of PEDs related to the doping scandal that led to the disqualification of the Russian athletes in the Olympics. Sports fans from all over the globe criticized Russia as a whole and thus this lead to its recent ban by the IAAF from participating in sports for 15 months. This shows how the use of PEDs has severe consequences on the careers of athletes and the reputation of their nations.
Conclusion
The discussion above gives a clear illustration of how Performance Enhancements Drugs are harmful to the health of the users. It has explained how PEDs at times lead to severe and irreversible health issues. Therefore, this informs the banning of performance enhancement drugs in most sporting competitions. It is important for one to recognize the demerits of PEDs so as to ensure proper measures are instituted and adhered to discourage their overreliance (Smith et al., 2010).
- Petróczi, A., & Aidman, E. (2008). Psychological drivers in doping: the life-cycle model of performance enhancement. Substance abuse treatment, prevention, and policy, 3(1), 7.
- Hodge, K., Hargreaves, E. A., Gerrard, D., & Lonsdale, C. (2013). Psychological mechanisms underlying doping attitudes in sport: Motivation and moral disengagement. Journal of sport and exercise psychology, 35(4), 419-432.
- Smith, A. C., Stewart, B., Oliver-Bennetts, S., McDonald, S., Ingerson, L., Anderson, A., … & Graetz, F. (2010). Contextual influences and athlete attitudes to drugs in sport. Sport management review, 13(3), 181-197.
Offered for reference purposes only.