Why Not Randomly Drug Test High School Athletes?

With all the commotion at the University of Waterloo and the drug problem that led to the Warriors football season being suspended for one year, there was quite a significant buzz in the high school world of sports on Monday too.

Some people who I spoke to claim there is a ticking time bomb waiting to explode in high schools. When it does, people will scatter, point fingers at everyone and look puzzled.

I must have heard it said 20 times in the span of an hour from teachers, coaches and parents. They claim there is an increase in the number of high school athletes who take performance enhancing drugs -- and nothing is done to deal with the problem. Now, I don't know if that is poppycock or fact.

Apparently, the money spent on public education on this topic has had little effect. Paul Melia, from the Canadian Centre for Ethics in Sports, said on radio on Monday that now is the time to be focussing on high schools. A fact: there is no system to randomly test high school athletes. Boards of Education don't believe kids use drugs to cheat in sports. In Ontario, schools have money to send Principals on conferences, but have to scrounge up coins to just keep school sports alive. Forget about testing for drugs.

To have finances for testing athletes, and hoping to get to the problem early, no way. Some administrators have also told me that steroid use in Toronto schools is highly exaggerated.

Athletic associations, and even OFSAA, have no rules or policies or even penalties in place on their websites to deal with students who are caught cheating by taking performance-enhancing drugs in sports. I can't believe every student that I have watched with bulging muscles and, you know what I mean, gets that strictly from training. If so, I must be from Mars.

In April of this year, Det. Constable Jerome Codrington of the Waterloo Regional Police told our sister paper in Kitchener that performance-enhancing drugs are more prevalent in schools.  So, I would assume a bigger city like Toronto just might have a problem.

Should kids be signing a pledge to not use steroids at the start of a school sports year?

I think so.

Should teachers and coaches and administrators, at the pre-season meeting for school sports teams, clearly articulate anti-drug use in sports along with messages about penalties, behaviour, practices and rules of eligiblity?

I think so.

Should every Board of Education, sports group, athletic association and even OFSAA have received a kick in the butt, after the Waterloo scandal broke, to finally get serious about this problem rather than put it off and focus more on the up-coming summer recess?

I think so.

High schools need to produce policies and rules to deal with students who cheat. They need to have penalties prepared and clearly communicated too. Students who use steroids and human growth hormone to give them an advantage over others need to be booted off teams and sent to proper authorities for assistance -- before they start asking questions about heart attacks, diabetes and more.

Comments

[Raymond]

I'm in favour of randomnly testing high school kids. Stop the problem and penalize the culprits severely. That will send a clear message that this is not to be tolerated. If people want to load their bodies with chemicals, do it in a garage or their own home and not cheat everyone else.

[J.B.]

Thank goodness we have a forum like this to share opinions because it is clearly evident how problematic our society is when I read some of the thoughts that flow out of the minds of people. Only one issue, the Toronto Star needs to do a better job screening comments from people who can offer up opinions that are sensible and those who have lost touch with reality.

[MEMPHIS]

WOW! You people need to start reading the above posts instead of covering this board with verbal diarrhea!
I will say again what I already said... Any of us inside the walls of education know that drug testing students would be suicide for the Ministry of Education and the lawsuits would bankrupt OFSAA. What's next the GTHL, OVFL or OVA going to start drug testing their athletes? Because a lot of these athletes play for their local high schools.
Anyways the arguement is mute. YOU WILL NEVER SEE IT HAPPEN. So keep complaining to one another it's meaningless.
Boo Hoo

[Mr. Forrester]

Hey, Memphis. You're a gutless fool. I have read the posts and understand them unlike you who seems to need someone to explain them to you. No one is talking about GTHL, OVFL or OVA.
Who cares about bankrupting OFSAA and they are an organization in disarray anyway and many of us teachers know that very well. We just want fairness for all schools.
I don't read anyone appealing for millions of dollars from the ministry of Education but maybe a few bucks from the lottery corporation would be nice.
And I am sure there are many corporate sponsors who would be willing to jump in to help kids now rather than bury them later.
We just need a leader to get this going - and that leader is certainly not you.

[Strength Coach]

Three things:
1: To those people who commented that there are no drugs in high school sports, you need a wake up call. I own a high performance gym in the GTA. I have kicked athletes out of our program for using steroids. They played high school sports and play in the GTHL.. 14-16 yrs old!!!!!!!!!

2: The current state of drug testing doesn't work. They test for metabolites not levels. If they really wanted to catch people they would hormone profile. The average male has between 500-1500 nano grams of testosterone for 100millileters of circulating blood, but when they test for metabolites someone can have 7000 nano grams and still be deemed clean, must be his training?? lol, sure. There is to much money being made by to many people in sports for them to want to clean it up. They'll catch a few people per year to make it look like they are doing something.

3: I would never promote steroids but they are not near as bad as people claim them to be. I find it interesting that if your healthy they say they will kill you but if your an aids patient its what is keeping you alive.. Anything can be dangerous with the right dosage.

Strength Coach