THERE'S something about the seedy Thai
beachside town of Pattaya that keeps enticing Michael Dorn back - but it's not
the sun, sea, sand or sex for which the resort is famous.
The
21-year-old from Blacktown is part of a thriving amateur bodybuilding
subculture that uses anabolic steroids and growth hormones as a fast track to
the ultimate ''ripped'' body. While the drugs are heavily restricted in
Australia by laws that are among the strictest in the world, Dorn - and
hundreds like him - have discovered a novel way around the problem: they travel
to Thailand on ''steroid vacations''.
A
Sun-Herald investigation has found that rather than risk prosecution in
Australia, everyday gym users are travelling to Asia and ''stacking'' a
dangerous cocktail of steroids that include powerful veterinary drugs and
fertility medicine.
While
police in Australia warn of a growing trade in steroids - and are increasingly
finding them during raids aimed at party drugs - health experts say the
products can cause life-threatening heart and liver damage, as well as baldness
and infertility.
But in
Thailand, price is part of the allure: during a two-week investigation, this
reporter visited Bangkok and Pattaya pharmacies that sell some steroid brands
for 10 times less than what they fetch on Sydney's black market.
The
rise of the steroid holiday was highlighted last year, when Australia's No. 1
amateur bodybuilding celebrity, Aziz ''Zyzz'' Shavershian, died of an
''undiagnosed'' heart condition in a Bangkok sauna. He died weeks after his
brother, Said Shavershian, or ''Chestbrah'', had been convicted for steroid
possession in Sydney.
Numerous
Australians in Thailand now tell The Sun-Herald of how they buy and consume
their steroids offshore rather than end up with a criminal record at home.
In 2006
the bodybuilder John Hurlock was arrested and charged at his Townsville home
for smuggling steroids into Australia. But Hurlock fled the country before he
could be prosecuted. Today, he lives in exile in central Bangkok, where he buys
the same drugs over the counter at his local chemist. ''I ordered steroids
online and the second time I did so, the Queensland cops came crashing through
my door with sniffer dogs. I find that crazy,'' Hurlock told The Sun-Herald in
Bangkok.
Each week,
he ''cycles'', which involves using a combination of Deca-Durabolin,
testosterone cypionate and trenbolone, a powerful horse drug that is widely
considered the best anabolic steroid on the black market, but the worst for
side effects.
''Why
should I not be able to take it, as and when I want?'' Hurlock asks. ''I'm not
hurting anybody and, as an older bloke, these drugs have particular benefits.
The deca works wonders for my joints and shoulder injuries.'' He is quick,
however, to criticise younger users: ''They are arriving here en masse and you
can spot them a mile off. They're like kids in candy stores. They get so dosed
up, they leave here looking like giant water bombs with acne. Vanity is
destroying them before they've even hit adulthood.''
Hurlock
is referring to Australians like Dorn. When The Sun-Herald met Dorn in Pattaya,
he was bulking up on his latest ''roid vacation''. Every 72 hours, he gets
''juiced up'' on testosterone cypionate and trenbolone. ''Anything I want,
everything that could potentially land me in hot water back in Australia, is
freely available over the counter here in chemists, no questions asked. I take
the steroids, I train and party in paradise and then I go home.''
He
believes Australians would be surprised by how many young people are flying to
Thailand mainly to take steroids, and ''even more shocked'' to learn how
widespread the trend has become back home.
''I'm
here [in Pattaya] for three weeks this time round. This is my fourth trip and
I've taken steroids each time. At first it was trial and error. Some pharmacies
sell fake stuff so it was a case of finding a brand and chemist I could
trust.''
Over
time - and after extensive internet research about other users' cycles - Dorn
says he increased his dosage to ''maximise results''.
''People
are paying $200 for a 10-millilitre bottle of testosterone in Sydney whereas
here you can walk into a chemist and buy it for between $20 and $30. I don't
use in Australia and wouldn't even know where to get it because I don't need the
trouble. I'm happy doing it here where nobody bothers me.''
A
hormone expert at Sydney's St Vincent's Hospital, Associate Professor Katherine
Samaras, says in poor countries ''anything can be bought for a song, whether
it's people, sex, or anabolic steroids''. She warns that, aside from triggering
''behavioural issues'', steroid abuse causes ''irreversible damage'' to the
heart, liver and body, including ''long-term testicular wasting''.
''Stupid
people do stupid things,'' she says. ''If people want to flout laws that are
designed to protect them and head to poor, lawless countries to destroy their
bodies, there's only so much you can do.''
In some
respects ''juicers'', as they are known, who travel to Thailand for steroids,
are no different to the many thousands of Australians who head there on
cosmetic holidays. Both groups view it as their basic right to sculpt or modify
their bodies in any way they see fit. Both choose Thailand because it is cheap,
with a tropical holiday thrown in. But for steroids users, it is a safe haven
to inject legally.
The
latest Australian Crime Commission statistics show there were 5561 border
detections of ''performance- and image-enhancing drugs'' in the last financial
year, a 106 per cent rise on the previous year. More than 90 per cent of those
seizures were postal orders from websites in countries such as the US, Hong
Kong, China and Thailand, where laws are more relaxed. In the previous year,
plane passengers had accounted for most seizures.
In
Australia these drugs are only legally available through tightly monitored
prescriptions on the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme. Used to stimulate bone
growth and appetite, they are occasionally prescribed to short children and to
people with chronic wasting conditions such as cancer and AIDS. Illegal
importers face up to $110,000 or five years' jail.
While
Michael Dorn says he has never suffered side effects, one of Australia's
leading endocrinologists, Professor Ken Ho, warns users are unknowingly
inducing a ''profound state of testosterone deficiency''.
''The
body regulates the production of testosterone to a level which optimises
health,'' Ho says. ''If those levels exceed what is ideal, there are internal
biological mechanisms to control that. So when people load their bodies with
huge amounts, the body senses there is too much and turns off its own
factory.'' Once that happens, ''health goes down the gurgler''.
''Users
want more of what they had. Their minds start telling them, 'This must be good
stuff because I feel better again.'
''It
becomes a form of addiction. This is what's happening on these trips. This is
what's happening in gyms across Australia, and this is also what's happening in
so-called anti-ageing clinics that currently sell these substances under the
guise of good health. There is no smart way to take these drugs. It's a shady
business.''
EAMONN
DUFF
No comments:
Post a Comment