Andro may be removed from supplements market
declared its support for a congress move to ban the marketing of
steroid hormone precursors like 'andro' as dietary supplements.
The US health secretary is due to announce action today on androstenedione, a substance used by athletes and famously by baseball player Mark McGwire to help achieve his record-setting home-run tally in 1998.
Republican John E. Sweeney last week reintroduced a bill to criminalize, andro, and earlier this week the issue was debated by the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science & Transportation in a hearing on steroid use in sports.
David Seckman, executive director of the NNFA, said: "We support the right of sports organizations to prohibit the use of any performance enhancing substance they deem unsafe or inappropriate."
He added that NNFA and several other industry trade associations have publicly announced support the Anabolic Steroid Control Act of 2003 introduced by Senators Joseph Biden (D-Del.) and Orrin Hatch (R-Utah). This legislation would place certain steroid hormone precursors such as androstenedione under the Controlled Substances Act and effectively prohibit their marketing as dietary supplements by regulating them as Schedule III controlled substances.
The US Antidoping Agency (USADA) and the National Football League is also backing the legislation.
Seckman added that "dietary supplements are not steroids. While some companies may have chosen to break the law by masquerading steroids as a dietary supplement it does not change that indisputable fact".
