Human growth hormone or HGH testing has never been administered to NFL players. However, being one of the popular performance-enhancing drugs, the league is making a way to include HGH in their drug testing procedures.

The NFL is open to the possibilities of giving HGH testing to the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA). As is recalled, the players and the players union have been resisting third party administration of drug testing. However, the league can unilaterally impose the drug-testing program including penalties and rules associated with it even without an agreement as a result of the labor problem.

WADA and NFL

WADA is overseeing the testing of Olympic athletes. This organization also produces the list of banned substances annually. Getting WADA to oversee the drug testing program is only one of the contingencies of the league once the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit declines a full stay of an injunction for lifting the lockout.

Besides using WADA, another option is getting the National Center for Drug Free Sport to oversee the drug testing. This is the organization that is collecting urine samples of NFL tests. Still, testing for cocaine and marijuana is left to the teams. The program focuses on performance enhancers like HGH as the league believes that they require a uniform policy for this procedure for more integrity of the league and their sports.

HGH Testing for Athletes

The popularity of HGH among athletes is getting more and more serious these days. HGH is a substance that can help optimize muscle and boost bone-building capacities of the body. This is also known to help in increasing metabolism and is known to burn fat faster, too. Though the body produces HGH naturally, supplementation is still on the rise. This is because athletes see them as a good way to get physical gains without being detected on whether it is naturally or artificially produced. With this, it is common that athletes abuse HGH supplements.

The introduction of HGH testing will make sure that the league and the game will be fair and credible enough. Making sure that no one abuses such drug for their advantage will make sure that the games will be clean all the time. However, the problem today is that most athletes and the union are against HGH testing. Detecting HGH use can only be done through blood testing. Since this is inconvenient for a lot of athletes, the drug testing as a whole is denounced by most of them. This is not to mention yet that blood testing for HGH detection is still garnering questions about its accuracy and validity.

Harsher Sanctions for Doping Players

Basically, HGH can offer a lot of positive effects to the body. However, with the abuse of this substance, it is just right to stop players who are abusing it. The question now is whether the union and the players will agree on this proposal once the lockout is over. One thing that worries many NFL players is the current punishment being implemented by WADA. Cheating athletes are given a minimum of 2 years suspension under WADA’s rules while the NFL only impose 4-game suspension from the games.

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