Vanity drives rising steroid abuse
More and more of us take drugs just to look good. But the risks are huge, finds Peta Bee
August 26, 2006
FIVE years ago, Caroline, 32, a TV researcher, joined a local gym with the aim of getting fit for her summer holiday. "I was fed up with being half a stone overweight," she says. "I hated my fat back and flabby arms and thought that I'd really get in shape."
She hired a personal trainer, who devised an individual training regimen, and she "tried really hard" to eat carefully.
"I went on a low-fat diet, but I still couldn't shift flab on certain parts of my body. When a close friend at work - who was extremely fit - mentioned a supplement that would help me replace fat with muscle and lean tissue, I thought: 'Give me some'."
The supplement was clenbuterol, a form of anabolic steroid - a synthetic drug derived from testosterone and used medically to promote growth and repair body tissue. She bought it from her friend's personal trainer, who said it was "the best fat-burner around, but wouldn't turn me into a body builder ... He also said it boosted libido".
He advised Caroline to take a 20mg tablet, two days on, two days off, for six weeks. "I thought I had nothing to lose."
Within a month of beginning the course and continuing her regular gym program - two yoga classes, a weights workout and a stint on the treadmill - Caroline (whose name has been changed) says: "People started commenting on how good I was looking and how much weight I had lost. I came down three cups in my bra size and felt good."
But there were less welcome side effects: "I became agitated and stressed about work. And I started getting palpitations and sweating. At first I wasn't sure it was the tablets, but once I stopped them I felt better. It was scary."
Caroline is one of a growing band of ordinary women who have taken anabolic steroids to achieve the slender, toned body of a celebrity. The attraction is that they increase muscle mass, although not necessarily bulk, reduce body fat and mean quicker recovery times from workouts.
Users report that they give a mental boost, mainly through sexual confidence and an improved body image.
Most start with steroids in tablet form, but some progress to injectable drugs, which allow for greater potency and are mistakenly thought to be less risky to the liver. They are hardly more expensive than an average course of vitamins and minerals.
The July edition of the Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine reported on a survey of British gyms, conducted last year by the University of Glamorgan, which revealed that the abuse of "certain prescription medicines among health club attendees has dramatically increased in the UK".
In the five years since conducting a similar study, the researchers have seen a 44 per cent increase in the use of some steroid and body-building drugs; one needle-exchange clinic in South Wales reported a rise of 600 needles from steroid users in one month.
Of the muscle-building drugs being taken, clenbuterol, ephedrine (a stimulant that causes weight loss) and growth hormone steroids were the most abused.
Once, the stereotypical steroid user was a beefcake with bulging biceps and protruding eyes. But what surprised professor Bruce Davies and his colleagues was that around 7 per cent of gym members questioned were women, who admitted taking steroids "for cosmetic purposes".
According to Michael Graham, another member of the Glamorgan team, these were women "attending everyday gyms, some of them in exclusive hotels, who wanted to lose body fat and tone up". His colleague Julien Baker says: "We were particularly concerned that some of the women using steroids were not even training regularly at the gym - they were taking the drugs purely to lose weight and look good."
In Australia there has been little research in this area since 1997, and experts concede that the people who are using steroids are a "hidden population".
Last year the National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre at the University of NSW published a "rapid assessment" of trends in the use of performance and image-enhancing drugs (PIEDs) in NSW, based on interviews with 60 male users.
Almost all (97 per cent) had experienced at least one minor physical side effect, usually increased appetite, water retention, smaller testicles, acne, increased sex drive or sleeplessness. Most (87 per cent) had also experienced some changes in mood or behaviour.
However, no deaths in Australia have been linked to PIEDs, and NDARC decided against adding steroids to the list of drugs that it monitors on a regular basis.
"This is a group that really isn't experiencing a great deal of harm," says NDARC information manager Paul Dillon. "Realistically, most of the people doing it get a lot of information, they do it quite carefully, and many are monitored by doctors.
"As a result you tend to find people don't experience severe problems - although that's not to say we are saying you should all go and do it."
In recent years, UK Sport has reported that steroid use among elite athletes has declined significantly, being replaced by more effective and less easily detected performance-enhancers. Yet steroid sales have never been higher and are the drugs of choice for those wanting to improve their appearance. Getting hold of these muscle-bulking agents is not difficult either. Ralph Heron - clinical co-ordinator of the Drugs in Sport Clinic and Users Support (Discus), a drop-in clinic in northern England - says that they are widely available on the internet and that "you could easily buy them at regular gyms", often from trainers or fellow members.
Statistics from UK needle-exchange centres indicate increasing numbers of users among young professionals. Disturbingly, they are getting younger. Robert Dawson, GP and Discus director, found steroids to be the third most common drug offered to 14 and 15-year-olds after cannabis and amphetamines.
Charles Yesalis, the head of exercise and sport science at Pennsylvania State University who has been studying the trend of steroid use in the US, says that the number of American teenage girls on steroids has doubled in the past decade to almost 200,000.
"I'd say that 500,000 to 600,000 kids in the US have used these drugs," he says. "Steroid use is at an all-time high. We've shown use down to 13 and 14-year-olds. It's scary for anyone to use these drugs, but in particular for women and children."
Yet their appeal to women is obvious. As professor Yesalis says: "A lean, toned-looking body is the most popular image portrayed among actresses and models; it seems likely that this fashion may be prompting girls and women to imitate these so-called ideals by using illegal drugs to build muscle." He adds that steroids have the added attraction of making a young person feel more popular and "more sexually attractive".
Yet this new breed of user could suffer long-term damage - teenagers may reach only 95 per cent of the adult height they would otherwise attain, and females taking male sex hormones can experience acne, smaller breasts on account of excessive fat loss, a deeper voice, irregular periods, excess facial and body hair, depression, paranoia and fits of anger."We don't know the full effects they could have on women's reproductive systems," says Yesalis. "When a young woman takes these drugs the possibility of permanent damage is significant as her body is still maturing."
Later this year the University of Glamorgan team begins a study into the precise effects that steroid taking has on young women.
