National Football League
NFL to perform HGH blood testing
National Football League

NFL to perform HGH blood testing

Published Aug. 4, 2011 1:00 a.m. ET

NFL players let go of their long-held “pin cushion” argument against testing for human growth hormone on Thursday, a move that could push other US sports leagues toward blood screening their athletes for performance-enhancing drugs.

Under the collective bargain agreement ratified by the National Football League Players Association, the goal is to make players subject to HGH testing beginning in Week 1 of the 2011 regular season, NFL spokesman Greg Aiello told FOXSports.com.

The league aims to make players subject to a test at least once per season. But the details of that issue still must be worked out between the league and the NFLPA, just as the sides must reach agreement on how the NFL will screen for HGH, the synthetic hormone that promotes muscle growth and reduces recovery time.

While the exact protocol is in flux, anti-doping experts applauded the agreement that makes the NFL the first major US sport to implement a test that Olympic athletes have been subject to for seven years.

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“This certainly isn’t winning the Super Bowl, but it’s a step in the right direction,” Travis Tygart, CEO of the US Anti-Doping Agency, told FOXSports.com. “We hope other leagues follow. It’s about doing that right thing for clean athletes. Why other leagues wouldn’t want to do the same, I can’t really say.”

Pro sports — and especially player unions — have been skeptical of the HGH test, which is costly, requires blood to be drawn and, before last year, had not produced a positive. But since February 2010, there have been a half-dozen positive results and officials came to terms that a urine test was still years away, at best.

Late NFLPA executive director Gene Upshaw summed up the attitude of most union heads when he said in 2006 that he was not interested in “turning my players into pin cushions."

Messages left with the NFLPA on Thursday were not immediately returned.

Major League Baseball instituted HGH testing in the minors last summer and commissioner Bud Selig said he’d like to see it in the majors. But, like the NFL, the players union would have to go along with it since drug policy is collectively bargained.

“Unions should not only be worrying about the financial welfare of their members, but also their personal welfare,” said Gary Wadler, a New York internist and chairman of the World Anti-Doping Agency's Prohibited List and Methods Subcommittee. “This a major health issue. This isn’t some innocuous drug with no adverse effects. The player associations should stand up and protect more than their players’ wallets.”

The current HGH test does have its drawbacks, including a detection window as short as 24 hours since it was last injected. That puts a premium on unannounced testing, something the NFL has been criticized for in the past, as some experts have said the league gives players too much notice. Other, more effective tests — which will also be blood-based — are on the horizon.

Without testing, the NFL has been able to go after players suspected of HGH use only through investigations.

Former New England Patriots safety Rodney Harrison was suspended for the first four games of the 2007 season and Dallas Cowboys quarterbacks coach Wade Wilson received a five-game ban in the same season after each was connected to purchases of HGH.

“HGH is a major issue,” Wadler said. “It’s hard to say we’ve come a long way if all the sports leagues aren’t testing for it. We’re not in the final mile of having adequate anti-doping programs, as some of them will have you believe. HGH is a fundamental doping agent.”

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