Effect of Performance Enhancing Drugs
Performance enhancing drugs are substances used by athletes to improve their performance in sports, such as anabolic steroids, creatine, and testosterone. More and more athletes nowadays are using performance enhancing drugs due to higher competition, and even some high school student athletes! Not only is it unfair, but it destroys the user’s body. Performance enhancing drugs can be tempting to teens because they will be better and have an edge. Another factor could be that they want a better body image and more muscle, and also peer pressure.
In professional sports, if you are caught using PEDs, you will most likely be suspended or even banned from the sport. Many star baseball players that were naturally talented ruined their careers by taking PEDs, including Alex Rodriguez, Melky Cabrera, Roger Clemens, and Barry Bonds. High schoolers will face similar consequences and probably will not be able to play on the team again, possibly crushing their ambitions to play sports in college. The use of these drugs are extremely unfair to athletes who actually work hard to get to where they are, and it will have many negative emotional and physical side effects to the user.
In 2001, 5% of male high school athletes were caught using PEDs, and the number is thought to be higher nowadays. More and more athletes are jeopardizing their careers by taking these PEDs which can cause liver tumors, an enlarged heart, hair loss, breast development, acne, reproductive issues, and stunted growth. If you have taken the drugs for a long time, you would waste time going through rehab, and time is what we high schoolers need most. Instead of cheating by taking illegal performance enhancing drugs, teens should focus on doing the right thing by getting stronger naturally by lifting and eating properly, such as lean protein.
Many people play on sports teams the fair way, but there are some that do it by cheating. This is known as doping, or the use of banned performance enhancing drugs
In professional sports, if you are caught using PEDs, you will most likely be suspended or even banned from the sport. Many star baseball players that were naturally talented ruined their careers by taking PEDs, including Alex Rodriguez, Melky Cabrera, Roger Clemens, and Barry Bonds. High schoolers will face similar consequences and probably will not be able to play on the team again, possibly crushing their ambitions to play sports in college. The use of these drugs are extremely unfair to athletes who actually work hard to get to where they are, and it will have many negative emotional and physical side effects to the user.
In 2001, 5% of male high school athletes were caught using PEDs, and the number is thought to be higher nowadays. More and more athletes are jeopardizing their careers by taking these PEDs which can cause liver tumors, an enlarged heart, hair loss, breast development, acne, reproductive issues, and stunted growth. If you have taken the drugs for a long time, you would waste time going through rehab, and time is what we high schoolers need most. Instead of cheating by taking illegal performance enhancing drugs, teens should focus on doing the right thing by getting stronger naturally by lifting and eating properly, such as lean protein.
Many people play on sports teams the fair way, but there are some that do it by cheating. This is known as doping, or the use of banned performance enhancing drugs