[Alerts] GOOD SPORTS / BAD SPORTS (1/25/05)

[League of Fans]

GOOD SPORTS / BAD SPORTS

League of Fans - January 25, 2005
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GOOD SPORTS
- Steroid Precursors No Longer Available Over the Counter
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BAD SPORTS
- Chairman of President's Fitness Council Peddling Junk Food
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* GOOD SPORTS *

- Steroid Precursors No Longer Available Over the Counter

Progress is being made in the fight against untested and unregulated 
sports supplements. On January 20, 2005, under the Anabolic Steroid 
Control Act of 2004, "Andro" and other prohormones (also known as 
steroid precursors) joined anabolic steroids as controlled substances 
and will now be considered illegal without a prescription under federal 
legislation signed into law last October.

Baseball fans unfamiliar with performance-enhancing drugs or other 
sports supplements may remember that Mark McGwire used andro 
(androstenedione) during his record-breaking home run season of 1998. In 
response to the doping scandal that has enveloped professional sports in 
recent years, andro was banned by Major League Baseball in 2004 as it 
had been by most other major sports leagues, the NCAA and International 
Olympic Committee.

But it is the health risks associated with muscle building prohormones 
(which essentially act as steroids inside the human body and carry with 
them similar side effects) that have brought so much controversy to 
these substances. Some of the known side effects for men and women 
include kidney and liver damage, pancreatic cancer, breast cancer, 
increased aggression and severe acne. For men specifically, side effects 
include breast development, baldness, enlarged prostate, reduced sperm 
production, testicular shrinkage and impotence. For women, side effects 
include deepened voice, increased facial hair growth, enlarged clitoris 
and disruption of menstrual cycles. For teenagers, side effects include 
disruption of normal growth patterns and processes, and stunted growth.

So, another sports supplement bites the dust. The last to be removed 
from the market were supplements containing ephedra. After about 150 
known deaths from ephedra (and more reports of stroke, arrhythmia, heart 
attacks, chest pain, seizures and hypertension for ephedra than for all 
other dietary supplements combined) it took the high-profile 2003 Spring 
Training death of Baltimore Orioles pitcher Steve Bechler to finally get 
ephedra-containing supplements removed from shelves.

Andro and ephedra products were previously available to everyone, 
regardless of age, with no guarantees of safety, effectiveness or even 
ingredients. But even with the ban, it is typical industry practice to 
replace one untested chemical with another. To be sure, other substances 
are already available with similar characteristics, and with the lack of 
testing, potentially comparable and dangerous side effects.

The Dietary Supplement Health & Education Act of 1994 (DSHEA) is the 
federal law that gutted the Food and Drug Administration's (FDA) 
authority to regulate nutritional supplements. Today, unlike drug 
products that must be proven by the FDA to be safe and effective for 
their intended use before marketing, DSHEA frees any product that calls 
itself a dietary supplement from federal regulation before they reach 
the consumer and does not require manufacturers and distributors to 
record, investigate or forward to the FDA any reports they receive of 
injuries or illnesses that may be related to the use of their products.

Last week, the Institute of Medicine of the National Academies issued a 
report titled "Complementary and Alternative Medicine in the United 
States," a major part of which addressed the problems associated with 
DSHEA. The report recommended to Congress that the regulation of dietary 
supplements be amended to improve quality control and consumer 
protections and to create incentives for research on the efficacy of 
these products.

It is the position of League of Fans that DSHEA be repealed. Public 
health and safety needs should come before the interests of the powerful 
and well-funded supplement industry. In sports, supplement use is 
widespread from the professional level all the way down to the junior 
high school athletes who easily purchase and fill their lockers with 
unregulated substances. These athletes are guinea pigs for the sports 
supplement industry, with no guarantees of safety, effectiveness or even 
ingredients.

League of Fans does not advocate the ban of dietary supplements, only 
that they be tested for safety prior to marketing and be produced in 
facilities meeting guidelines similar to those required of 
non-prescription and prescription drug makers. We are opposed to the 
promotion of dietary supplements for any use that has not been proven to 
the FDA.
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More Information:

Andro Supplement Ban Takes Effect
National Public Radio - January 20, 2005
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4460819

Supplements (this five-part piece is over three years old now, but is 
still the best report on supplements and DSHEA)
Luke Cyphers and Michael O’Keefe, New York Daily News - July 15, 2001
http://apse.dallasnews.com/contest/2001/writing/over250.enterprise.third1.html

A deadly game of politics (published after the ephedra-related death of 
Steve Bechler)
Luke Cyphers, ESPN The Magazine - March 18, 2003
http://espn.go.com/magazine/cyphers_20030318.html

League of Fans' Position on the Use of Steroids and other 
Performance-Enhancing Substances in Sports - January 14, 2005
http://www.leagueoffans.org/drugsposition.html

Ralph Nader and League of Fans Urge Leaders to Take Real Action Against 
Ephedra and Dietary Supplement Law - March 11, 2003
http://www.leagueoffans.org/ephedrarelease.html
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* Take Action! *

1) Urge Congress to take real action against the Dietary Supplement 
Health & Education Act of 1994 (DSHEA):

Contact your senators:
http://www.senate.gov/

Contact your representative:
http://www.house.gov/writerep/

Call the U.S. Capitol Switchboard to be connected with your senators' or 
representative's office:
(202) 224-3121

2) Emphasize participation over winning in your own household, school 
and community. The pressure of a sports environment that has a "win at 
all costs" attitude jeopardizes health and safety and increases the 
potential for injury. Our current sports culture fuels the use of 
performance-enhancing substances at almost all levels of competition and 
age groups, as well as in most sports. Putting the health and safety of 
players at risk just to win should have no place in sports. For players, 
sports should be about safe participation and enjoyment, never winning 
at all costs.

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* BAD SPORTS *

- Chairman of President's Fitness Council Peddling Junk Food

Conflict of interest? Pro football Hall of Famer Lynn Swann, chairman of 
the President's Council on Physical Fitness and Sports, was paid to 
appear next to a vending machine filled with junk food alongside 
elementary school kids at a vending machine trade group press conference 
on January 13.

Over the last 20 years, rates of obesity have doubled in children and 
tripled in teens and there is a nationwide movement against the junk 
food and vending machine industries for their roles in this epidemic. 
Lynn Swann was hired by the National Automatic Merchandising Association 
(NAMA) to help push a plan to place labels ranking the nutritional value 
of vending-machine products in an attempt to beat back efforts by 
parents and public health groups to curb the sale and marketing of junk 
food in public schools. This public relations ploy is called the 
Snackwise Nutrition Rating System and is being promoted as a "national 
campaign to fight childhood obesity."

"A presidential appointee whose primary job is to promote physical 
fitness has no business cutting financial deals with an industry that is 
peddling junk food," said Merrill Goozner of the Center for Science in 
the Public Interest (CSPI). "It is a gross conflict of interest. His job 
is to do just the opposite. His job is to get the junk food out of kids 
daily diets because it is a major contributor to childhood obesity which 
is growing at epidemic proportions in this country."

"We knew that he (Swann) was with the President’s Council," NAMA 
spokesperson Jackie Clark said. "That matched our message very nicely. 
But Lynn Swann asked us not to mention his relationship because it would 
look like an endorsement from the President's Council. And he is doing 
this as an individual." But NAMA's press advisory for the event 
identified him as the chairman of the President's Council on Physical 
Fitness and Sports.

Michael Jacobson, the executive director for CSPI, wrote a letter to 
Secretary of Health and Human Services Tommy Thompson to urge President 
Bush to fire Swann and to dismiss any other council members who take 
junk food money. "An appointment to the President's Council on Physical 
Fitness and Sports is a great honor," Jacobson wrote. "Surely we can 
reserve it just for those athletes and others who choose not to profit 
financially through affiliations with makers and distributors of junk 
foods."

It is the position of League of Fans that schools should help parents 
promote health, fitness and good nutrition, rather than support junk 
food companies that target children with products high in added sugar 
and fat. School lunch programs should be fully funded and should make 
healthful food available to children. The marketing and sale of junk 
food should be prohibited on school property. We discourage sports 
personalities from paid endorsements for unhealthful products, 
especially for those marketed to children and those marketed in schools.
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More Information:

Bush's Fitness Chair Lynn Swann Hooks Up With Vending Industry
Corporate Crime Reporter - January 12, 2004
http://www.corporatecrimereporter.com/swann011205.htm

Nutrition Watchdogs Urge Firing of Lynn Swann
Center for Science in the Public Interest - January 13, 2005
http://www.cspinet.org/new/200501131.html

Michael Jacobson Wants Bush to Fire Lynn Swann
Corporate Crime Reporter - January 13, 2005
http://www.corporatecrimereporter.com/resign011305.htm

Guidelines for Marketing Food to Kids Proposed
Center for Science in the Public Interest
http://cspinet.org/new/200501051.html

Childhood Obesity Prevention Agenda for States, Municipalities and 
School Boards
Commercial Alert
http://www.commercialalert.org/copa.htm

Parents' Bill of Rights
Commercial Alert
http://www.commercialalert.org/pbor.pdf (PDF)

The Fast Food Trap: How Commercialism Creates Overweight Children
Gary Ruskin, Mothering - November/December 2003
http://www.commercialalert.org/index.php/category_id/2/subcategory_id/36/article_id/236
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* Take Action! *

1) Contact Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS) Tommy Thompson 
and ask him to urge President Bush to prohibit the commercial 
endorsement of junk food manufacturers by members of the President’s 
Council on Physical Fitness and Sports.

The Honorable Tommy Thompson
Secretary
Department of Health and Human Services
200 Independence Avenue, SW
Washington, DC 20201

tel (202) 619-0257

Secretary Thompson, who is soon to leave HHS, did a good job in pushing 
for the federal government to promote healthier lifestyles and 
encouraging the food and beverage industries to alter advertising and 
offer healthier choices to consumers. Confirmation by the full Senate is 
expected next week for Michael Leavitt, President Bush's nominee to 
replace Tommy Thompson as Secretary.

2) Support the "Prevention of Childhood Obesity Act" (S. 2894) 
introduced on October 5, 2004 by Senator Edward Kennedy (D-MA). "A bill 
to amend the Public Health Service Act to provide for the coordination 
of Federal Government policies and activities to prevent obesity in 
childhood, to provide for State childhood obesity prevention and 
control, and to establish grant programs to prevent childhood obesity 
within homes, schools, and communities."

Among the excellent provisions, the bill would require schools that 
receive federal funds to establish polices to "ban vending machines that 
sell foods of poor or minimal nutritional value," such as soda, soft 
drinks and candy.

The "Prevention of Childhood Obesity Act" is currently in the Senate 
Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions. Contact your 
senators and urge them to support this bill:
http://www.senate.gov/

Read the summary:
http://www.commercialalert.org/pcoasum.pdf (PDF)

Read the full text:
http://www.commercialalert.org/pcoa.pdf (PDF)

3) Write a letter to the members of your local school board, asking them 
to ban the marketing and sale of junk food in your local schools.

4) Contact your state legislators and ask them to introduce and support 
state legislation to ban the marketing and sale of junk food in your 
state’s schools. To find out the names and contact information of your 
state legislators, go to the Project Vote Smart website:
http://www.vote-smart.org/mystate_government_resources.php


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industry's relationship to society, exposing irresponsible business 
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to contribute to societal well-being.

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