PED in Sports Essay Sample
Many people in today's society know about PEDs, or Performance Enhancing Drugs. However, many people still do not know the effects that they can have on an athlete or person, and whether they are good or bad. PEDs can have many physical advantages for athletes trying to improve their abilities or get a head start in their sport. While PEDs can give you many positive benefits, they can also have some very negative side effects on your body. So, does the use of PEDs actually help or hurt an athlete within the sports world and is their use good for the sports world?
About PEDs
In 2014, a study was done about the use of PEDs in high school and they found that about 3.7% of high school athletes have used some form of performance enhancing drugs throughout their high school career(Weeks, 2014). This means that about 600,000 high school athletes have used some form of a performance enhancing drug throughout their high school career. Many athletes think that using PEDs is the only way they can make it to the next level in sports. It is reported that only 1 in 50,000 high school athletes actually make it to Division 1 college sports(Weeks, 2014). A lot of high school athletes and coaches think they can increase the chances of making it to the next level by taking a drug. However, in many cases this can only hurt the athlete if they were to get caught or feel the negative side effects of the drug.
A PED is taken mostly by athletes looking to increase their athletic abilities. Some of benefits are increased muscle gain or a quicker recovery time(Tyler, 2021). Some types of PEDs include: steroids, human growth hormones, and blood doping(Tyler, 2021). While some performance enhancing drugs are not banned in the sports world, most of them are considered illegal. PEDs have been around for centuries with evidence of them being used dating back to 776 B.C. where athletes would take them before Olympic games(History of PEDs in Sport, 2021). The drugs have made many changes since the B.C. 's and that is why there continues to be athletes who use them.
Pros of PEDs
While many professional sports ban the use of PEDs, they can actually have a positive impact on not only a player but a whole league. Steroids are the most commonly used PED by athletes. Steroids are hormones that are put into an athlete's system to influence their body to produce more testosterone which allows their body to speed up the process of muscle gain and recovery(Wedro, 2007) . A few advantages that Steroids or Anabolic Steroids can offer include: increased muscle growth, enhanced fat loss, faster recovery, and better endurance(Top 15 Benefits of Anabolic Steroids, 2021). Steroids can help achieve up to a 38% increase in strength, while women would get a much bigger increase(What Do Performance-Enhancing Drugs Do to Your Body, 2016). Steroids can be a very beneficial thing for athletes looking to gain muscle mass or physical strength. Another common PED is blood doping which is taking blood out of an athlete's body and then putting it back into their body at a later time(What Do Performance-Enhancing Drugs Do to Your Body, 2016). This process gives their body more red blood cells allowing them to take in more oxygen which can increase their endurance by up to 34%(What Do Performance-Enhancing Drugs Do to Your Body, 2016). Another positive of performance enhancing drugs is the ability to help athletes recover from injuries faster. Professional football player Ray Lewis was able to recover from a torn bicep in half the time doctors expected it was going to take(Hedrick, 2013). While it is not legal for athletes to take PEDs, it could be very beneficial to their careers if they succeed. A study was done on MLB athletes to see if there was a correlation between taking steroids and the effects on their salaries and statistics. The data showed that there was a positive correlation between an increase in salary and taking steroids. This means the players that took steroids were going to make more money than those who didn’t(Pantuosco, 2011). However, there was a negative correlation between taking steroids and All Star appearances. This means if an athlete took steroids, they would make less All Star games(Pantuosco, 2011). The data shows that there is a positive effect in taking steroids in terms of salary earned. While PEDs are banned in almost every sport, they do provide a lot of benefits for athletes.
Cons of PEDs
PEDs can be dangerous for athletes later on in their life and can cause many problems with their physical and mental health. Steroids, which is a type of PED, can have many effects on the user's body including: infertility, shrunken testicles, high blood pressure, and severe acne(Mayo, 2017). While there are many side effects of steroids, I only listed a few. Another common PED is growth hormones. Some side effects that come from growth hormones are: joint pain, muscle weakness, fluid retention, and diabetes(Mayo, 2017). Almost every PED comes with negative side effects that can affect an athlete’s health later on in their life. Adam Gusky was an athlete who chose to use PEDs to improve his athletic abilities. However, he faced many side effects from taking PEDs like anger issues and depression which led to him eventually quitting them(VOA, 2016). Overall, performance enhancing drugs can cause many problems to an athletes body that can hurt their body a lot more than it could benefit it.
Should PEDs be allowed in sports
Performance enhancing drugs can do many great things for athletes and their athletic abilities. However, they should not be allowed in professional sports. If PED use or doping was allowed in sports, the negative side effects of PEDs would only get worse because more athletes would be using them(Ashby, 2010). The use of sports would also ruin the integrity and origins of sports. Instead of athletes having to work hard, they can just take a drug allowing them to take an easy way out. The overall interest in sports would then decrease(Ashby, 2010).
People will argue that PEDs can help athletes recover from their injuries faster. It could also give players who are not as physically gifted a chance to compete with those who are. While it would be nice for athletes to be able to return from injuries, it would also hurt those same athletes in the future with other problems that could occur from taking PEDs(Hedrick, 2013). PEDs could make sports more fair and equal. However, that would take the fun and joy out of the athletes who don't need the drugs to be able to succeed. PEDs should not be allowed in the sports world because the negatives would outweigh the positives. They should make special leagues where performance enhancing drugs are allowed.
Conclusion
Performance enhancing drugs have been a major topic all throughout sports for the past couple of decades. They have had major impacts on athletes and their careers and many leagues have focused more of their interest on them. Performance enhancing drugs have positives and negatives and can affect every athlete differently. Tony Mandarich used PEDs throughout his high school and his college career but when he got to the NFL, everything changed and he was eventually out of the NFL in a matter of years(Tony Mandarich, n.d.). Tony was an example of an athlete who experienced the negatives of performance enhancing drugs. PEDs should not be allowed in the sports world because of the harm it could cause to sports. However, performance enhancing drugs do have some positive effects and should be used to help athletes recover from injuries. PEDs have positive and negative effects in athletes and should be used very carefully if an athlete intends to use them legally.
