Point/Counterpoint: Allow Drugs in Sports

Jan. 10, 2008 — -- These point/counterpoint essays are part of a live public policy debate series in New York City called Intelligence Squared U.S., which is an initiative of The Rosenkranz Foundation.

For more information and to listen to past debates, go to www.iq2US.org

Since the beginning of recorded history, competitive athletes have tried to enhance their performance in every way imaginable. Naked Greeks put on shoes. Babylonians used herbs. Kenyans trained at high altitude. American swimmers used greasy swimsuits. Marathoners loaded their bodies with carbohydrates. But none of these enhancing technologies has created the hysteria surrounding anabolic steroids and human growth hormone (HGH).

What are the claims of those who would condemn elite athletes or send them to prison for trying to maximize their performance? The simple answer is that they are breaking the rules, or in some cases, the law. But the rules depend on arguments or claims that are morally incoherent, hypocritical, or based on ice-cold wrong information.

Critics assert that athletes who use performance-enhancing drugs have an unfair advantage. But an advantage is only unfair if it is not equally available. This is usually solved by equalizing access, not by prohibition. The hypocrisy is everywhere. The same year Ben Johnson was vilified for using drugs that were by all accounts widely available, Janet Evans, the American swimmer, boasted about the greasy swimsuits that the Americans had kept secret from their competitors. Bud Selig, the commissioner of baseball, preaches about a level playing field but tolerates a system in which the Yankees spend two to four times as much as all but a few competitors.

Critics assert that steroids and HGH cause life-threatening harm, but the claims are wildly exaggerated or simply made up. Lyle Alzado, Exhibit A for the perils of steroids, died of a brain tumor, but there is not a single medical source showing any association between his tumor and steroids. We are told repeatedly that steroids cause heart disease and strokes but it is hard to identify a single elite athlete who suffered either calamity while using steroids. HGH has been given to half a million children for decades and there is little evidence of any serious harm. In fact, the major risk of these drugs is caused by the policies of driving them underground, manufactured in unknown conditions with no oversight by regulatory agencies, and no possibility of careful studies to assess the benefits and risks.

Norman Fost, M.D., M.P.H., is professor of pediatrics and bioethics at the University of Wisconsin, and director of the Bioethics Program which he founded in 1973. He has published widely on ethical and legal issues in health care, and served on numerous federal committees, including President Clinton's Health Care Task Force, and from 1994-1998 was an elected member of the Princeton University Board of Trustees.