Are Bodybuilding Supplements Tainted With Steroids?
Recently the worlds largest bodybuilding site Bodybuilding.com was raided for selling steroids. According to several news articles a few products were found to contain anabolic steroids online. The products confiscated included the following ingredients: Madol, Tren, Superdrol, Androstenedione, and Turinabol. How can Bodybuilding.com make a huge mistake such as this one? Did they really distribute products containing steroids?
The answer is actually very simple. The ingredients mentioned are considered to have steroidal effects but were not considered steroids before. Some years back, the FDA allowed the so-called pro-hormones to be sold legally. This pro-hormones are substances which when broken down by the body become synthetic testosterone. A form of steroid.
Technically these pro-hormones are not steroids but turn into steroids when introduced to the body. Simply put the listed materials that the FDA tested and found to be active in some products were not previously classified as steroids. It did not help that these products were marketed to have “steroid-like” effects. They are nowhere near as potent the real testosterone based steroids. But claims like these did attract the attention of many buyers. Unfortunately, it also caught the attention of the FDA.
It seems that these steroid-like pro-hormones were re-classified by the FDA. Putting them on the same class of illegal substances as steroids. Therein lays the dilemma. The definition of steroids. The FDA needs to put out a comprehensive list on what it classifies as illegal steroid substances. It is thought that the FDA will release guidelines so strict that the supplement industry might only be allowed to sell Protein Powders. It wasn’t that long ago that creatine got center stage in the steroid saga.
So this is a very sensitive matter. A great majority of supplements do not contain steroids. And the small number that did have already been confiscated through raids conducted by the FDA. Therefore leaving us with steroid-free supplements for now. That is until the FDA finds itself redefining the definition of steroids once more.
