Ceilidh

Michael Zey
futurist3000@aol.com

By TOBY STERLING
.c The Associated Press

UTRECHT, Netherlands (AP) - Experts believe athletes and coaches will soon turn to gene doping in an attempt to gain a performance edge.

Authorities told a workshop on gene doping Saturday that recent discoveries have made it inevitable that athletes and coaches will try to abuse gene therapy to gain an edge in speed, strength or endurance - despite huge health risks.

``I'm very pessimistic - I think it won't take very long,'' said Hidde Haisma, a professor of gene therapy at the University of Groningen. The needed tools ``are available at labs around the world,'' he said.

Though the idea of manipulating genes to enhance performance has been around for more than a decade, it gained attention this year after a University of Pennsylvania study showed that muscle mass, strength and endurance in rats can be increased by altering their genes.

Scientists have treated roughly 3,000 humans suffering from life-threatening illnesses with gene therapy, but few cases have been successful and some have been fatal.

In one non-human study where monkeys' genes were manipulated to produce an extra protein called erythropoietin, some of the monkeys developed the disease anemia.

Given the risks involved, the first gene doping in the sports world may be in an animal sport like dog racing, Haisma said.

But Olivier Rabin, science director at the World Anti-Doping Agency, said human athletes won't wait long. He pointed to instances when athletes began using new steroids ``straight from the test tube, before they were even tested on animals.''

Current blood and urine tests cannot detect gene doping, and Haisma said the most promising technique of detection involved analyzing the proteins in blood samples, looking for a suspicious spike.

``There is no doubt in the minds of people working in the sports community that gene doping is coming,'' he said.



04/17/04 14:46 EDT
   
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