That's a good one. I say, if we do that, we may as well get rid of OSHA altogether, go back to the good old days where kids get stuck in the chimneys and like it!
I've had that thought before. It normally comes after some scandal, in the guise of "they're all doing it anyway, might as well make it legal so they can do it safely". Then I realize that if literally every athlete had to do it (which is what would happen), it would become even more prevalent in high school/college/middle school, and that's not something that I want to happen.
I am not advocating for athletes all becoming medical super-humans like the Russian dude in Rocky IV. Here's my thinking:
"Normal" ranges for things like hematocrit, iron levels, testostorone are really large and there is a huge difference from being in the bottom of the "normal" range and near the top of the "normal" range. Both are considered safe. When people drop below those normal levels by a standard deviation, drug therapies are employed to bring them back into the normal range. I experienced this myself, but the second I was in the normal range, of course, they stopped. I felt so much better that I can only imagine what it might be like to be in the high end of the normal range. When you go above normal, it becomes unsafe and people sometimes die or experience other health issues.
I could go to an anti-aging clinic now and a medical doctor would augment my testosterone and monitor it into safe-normal ranges.
There is legitimate medical practice around this. The problem is people scoring drugs from their team mates and self administering without any bloodwork.
Professional sports have gotten way more difficult in terms of # of games played, length of seasons and intensity of things like bike racing over an extended month.
A former minor league baseball player told me that they used lighter bats at the end of the season than at the beginning because they couldn't swing them anymore. During the baseball steroids era I wasn't surprised by the home run hitters who were obviously juiced, but by the pitchers and 2nd basemen who said "it's not about being bigger, it's about recovering from injury faster. I couldn't play a full season without this."
So, what if: There were medical protocols for sports medicine that responsibly and safely included tuning of these aspects of athletics blood chemistry. Doctors and athletes had to disclose what they were doing and lab work was mandatory to ensure that the athlete was staying within normal limits. If you go above normal limits, you are suspended and not re-instated until your lab work comes back normal. If you continually go above, then your treatment protocol is no longer approved. If anyone gets caught doing anything that isn't part of an approved, registered, professionally administered protocol they are barred from the sport for life. We give you a way to do it above board, that covers all of the legitimate excuses and levels the playing field with people who's body naturally produces higher levels of those things. Anything else is cheating and dangerous and you can't play anymore, no second chances.
