By Staff
Coaching Management, 8.6, September 2000, http://www.momentummedia.com/articles/cm/cm0806/bbsteroid.htm
The National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) recently launched a campaign to counter rising steroid use among teenagers. The multimedia public education initiative will be centered around a new Web site and will include the distribution of a Community Drug Alert Bulletin plus an updated report about anabolic steroids, which explains their effects, as well as approaches to prevent their use.
As Dr. Alan Leshner, NIDA’s Director, explained at a news conference earlier this year, “In December, 1999, when our ‘Monitoring the Future’ survey showed that anabolic steroid use by 8th and 10th graders had increased, and that the perceived risk about steroids had declined among 12th graders, we knew we had to take steps to reverse this trend before it gained momentum,” explained
According to the 1999 survey, 2.7 percent of 8th and 10th graders and 2.9 percent of 12th graders reported that they had taken anabolic steroids at least once in their lives. These figures represent increases of about 50 percent since 1991 (the first year that data on steroid abuse were collected from the younger students) among 8th and 10th graders and 38 percent among 12th graders.
During the news conference, NIDA also highlighted a prevention program for young male athletes developed by Dr. Linn Goldberg and Dr. Diane Elliot, both of Oregon Health Sciences University. With NIDA funding, Drs. Goldberg and Elliot devised and demonstrated the effectiveness of the “Adolescents Training and Learning to Avoid Steroids” (ATLAS) program in the Portland area. ATLAS uses a team-centered and gender-specific approach that addresses key risk and protective factors associated with anabolic steroids and other drug use.
The Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association (BCBSA) is mounting a similar effort through its Healthy Competition Campaign. BCBSA hopes the campaign will reduce the use of these drugs through education and by encouraging all athletes to resist their use.
As part of its efforts, the Healthy Competition Campaign has planned a number of activities, including the formation of the Healthy Competition Foundation, a nonprofit corporation that will oversee the campaign and serve as a long-term educational and research organization on the issue. It will also be coordinating individuals and organizations to form an Army of Advocates, which will support the Foundation through public service announcements and grassroots efforts.
Educational “Take the Pledge” events will also be held during which student-athletes will be encouraged to sign the Healthy Competition drug-free athletics pledge. Leading athletes will speak at these events, which will also provide educational information on performance-enhancing drugs.
Through its publications and Web site, the BCBSA campaign provides educational material on the negative effects that performance-enhancing drugs can have. Jerry Diehl, Assistant Director of the National Federation of State High School Associations, feels it’s important for coaches and administrators to arm themselves with as much knowledge as they can since their athletes will likely try to do the same.
“As a former athletic director, I would look at every one of these programs as an awareness program,” Diehl says. “I’ve talked to some coaches who say, ‘I don’t tell them anything about drugs because I don’t know anything about them. I just tell them to stay off them.’ But that’s not the right attitude—the kids want the knowledge. If you just tell them ‘Don’t do it,’ they’re going to go find the information somewhere else. So you’d be better off doing a little bit of work and at least tell them where they can go to for more information, like a health department or nurse or other health professional.”
For more information on the ATLAS program, call (503) 494-8051 or visit .
For more information about the Healthy Competition Campaign, visit or write to: Healthy Competition, P.O. Box 6169, Washington, DC 20044-6169.