Doping law: 'Zero tolerance'

2005-04-27 17:00

Washington - US lawmakers will consider a "zero tolerance" bill for steroids in all levels of American sport "in the very near future", US House Government Reform Committee chair Tom Davis said on Wednesday.

"Legislation, I think, will be introduced in that regard very shortly," Davis said before a hearing on steroids in the National Football League, a follow-up to March's 11-hour session on Major League Baseball's steroid woes.

"We want a bill that goes across amateur and professional sports, basically a no-tolerance policy. I expect that in the very near future."

But leagues would likely be left to decide their own punishments, Davis said, making it unlikely they would adopt the World Anti-Doping Agency standard of a two-year ban for a first steroid violation.

The hearing comes a day after a US university study showed steroids are popular with pre-teen US girls who seek a more statuesque womanly form at a young age.

Girls using steroids

"Seven percent of middle-aged school girls are now using steroids to give their bodies tone, to make them look better. This is dangerous," Davis said. "These drugs are not only illegal, they are dangerous."

The NFL and US Anti-Doping Agency together established a doping laboratory near Salt Lake City to combat doping, but even NFL Commissioner Paul Tagliabue admits that genetic manipulation might soon turn television bionic myth into 21st Century reality.

"The 'Six Million-Dollar Man' will no longer be a television fantasy but will instead become a near-term reality," Tagliabue said.

"When that happens, the issues that our society is discussing today... will be as irrelevant as the blacksmith in the automobile age."

The moves by Tagliabue come in the wake of revelations last month that members of the Carolina Panthers filled prescriptions for NFL-banned steroids before playing in the 2004 Super Bowl.

Davis said a steroid hearing with National Basketball Association officials is planned in the next month and a session with the National Hockey League is planned as lawmakers seek insight before imposing a federal sport steroid ban.

"We do want to get involvement at the professional sports level. That's very important. Kids will emulate what they see the professional stars doing," said Davis.

"We're targeting America's youth who are taking steroids in epidemic proportions. It has got to be zero tolerance."

- AFP