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September 5, 2008 12:47:46 PM CDT

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Need an Edge? Try Performance Enhancing Placebos

Posted Nov 2, 07 7:36 AM CDT in Science & Health,  Sports 

(Newser) – If there’s nothing actually illegal in your steroid injection, is it still cheating? Placebos, long one of medicine’s top tools, can act as performance enhancing drugs, a new study has proven. The study pitted athletic young men against each other in a pain-endurance contest. Those given a morphine placebo won handily. Of course, the athletes have to believe they’re actually cheating.

Morphine, and other drugs providing temporary advantages, are only verboten during competitions, according to World Anti-Doping rules. So it would be perfectly legal to begin a morphine regimen in the off-season and continue it with placebos while competing. Their effectiveness would depend on athlete credulity, but as the Economist notes, doctors have been getting away with this stuff for millennia.

Source Economist

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  (Shutterstock)
Marion Jones of the United States, celebrates after winning the gold medal in the 100m at the Summer Olympics ,Saturday, Sept. 23, 2000, at Olympic Stadium in Sydney. Jones admitted using steroids before...   (Associated Press)
San Francisco Giants' Barry Bonds follows the flight of his two-run home run against the Colorado Rockies in the first inning of a baseball game in Denver in this Sept. 5, 2007 file photo. (AP Photo/David...   (Associated Press)
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