Scientists rubbish Enhanced Games’ claims that doping causes no harm

Enhanced Games competitors run the risk of their libido being “killed off” as well as a greater chance of heart attacks and psychiatric issues by taking performance enhanced drugs, leading experts have warned.

Prof Ian Broadley, whose research has been supported by the World Anti-Doping Agency, and his colleague Martin Chandler, a research fellow who specialises in PEDs, also told the Guardian that organisers’ claims that banned drugs can be made safer if taken under medical supervision are “incorrect and misleading”.

Organisers of the Enhanced Games revealed on Wednesday that they will stage a four-day event in Las Vegas next year, but confirmed that they had already given the Greek swimmer Kristian Gkolomeev $1m for dipping under the 50 metre freestyle world record time by using banned drugs.

Meanwhile the Australian former Olympic swimmer, James Magnussen, has said that he “feels like 18 again” after taking testosterone, peptides and banned drugs, including BPC-157, CJC-1295 and the growth hormone ipamorelin to prepare for the event.

However, Boardley and Chandler have warned that Magnussen and other Enhanced Games competitors are underestimating the risks and dangers from taking steroids and other experimental drugs.

“BPC-157 has had very limited human trials so we don’t have robust human data for that, while ipamorelin which was discontinued when it was as a pharmaceutical drug,” Chandler said. “Neither is FDA approved.”

“We are also now starting to see some serious long-term effects from steroid use in the research,” he added. “Things like reproductive function or libido just being killed off with no real clear understanding of why. A person’s hormone levels appear fine, but their function isn’t.”

In their new paper, Harm reduction in the Enhanced Games: Can performance enhancing drugs be safe?, the University of Birmingham academics also warn of the potential dangers of taking testosterone for the heart.

They write that it has been linked with “serious cardiovascular conditions such as dyslipidemia, myocardial infarction, arrhythmia, atherosclerosis, cardiomyopathy and left ventricular hypertrophy as well as significantly higher coronary artery plaque volume and reduced ejection fraction … compared to non-using controls.”

“With testosterone, there are a bunch of adverse side effects,” said Chandler. “But symptoms like acne, shrinking testicles or the development of man boobs are obvious, and can be managed or will fade once you’ve stopped using. But the risks to cardiovascular function is probably the most serious issue, because it’s hidden and harder for people to track what is happening.”

“With reduced ejection fraction, the heart has to work really hard to pump blood around the body,” he added. “And if you don’t take steps to mitigate that, it’s probably going to end up with a heart attack. And while some people are fine a year after they stop using testosterone, other people really aren’t.”

The paper also points to studies showing “evidence of a range of psychiatric conditions including depression, anxiety and mania that appear to be significantly more prevalent amongst steroid users than the general population”.

Dr Dan Turner, the Enhanced Games’ director of athlete safety and performance, has insisted that with proper monitoring the risks of taking banned drugs can be minimised. “It’s not the use of these substances that’s inherently dangerous,” he says. “It’s the misuse of these substances.”

However, Boardley disagrees. “They’re giving the impression that this can be done safely, because it is medically supervised,” he said. “That’s just not right. It’s incorrect and misleading.

“Some of the evidence of the adverse effects is only starting to come through after 10-20 years of people using these substances. So monitoring something in the very short term is not going to give any information about some of the more harmful effects.”

Boardley added: “Often one of the hidden dangers is the likelihood of developing a dependency on anabolic steroids. When you stop using, it has very serious effects on your mood state, because your body’s own production of testosterone stops, which then encourages people to then restart.”