The athletic edge of biogenesis doping scandals

Here we go again. Nice going A-Rod! According to the current Daily News story on Alex Rodriguez and the big Biogenesis doping scandal, you really don't have to look very far to find a scandalous story on doping in professional sports or in the Olympics. If the person using the dope is told by someone else or otherwise believes they can beat the system and gain the competitive edge by cheating, they'll do it. In fact many never do get caught.

Think of all of the people who were able to skate by and not get caught. I'll bet there's a lot of them. One of the worst things for the cheater, or one of the best things for everyone else to happen in modern science is the ability to go back in time by re-analyzing blood, urine or other samples taken a long time ago. The testing continues to improve.

Likewise, the chemicals used to enhance performance continue to change in ways developed in-part, to avoid detection. Performance enhancing drugs are not new. From the first steroids abused through ingestion by mouth and then injected, to new boutique developments using the same methods of supplementing or dosing "doping" to what we now have as blood transfusions as in the case of Lance Armstrong.

The cheating mentality will always be pervasive in sports as well as in other areas of life. Students find new ways to cheat in school, professional licensees find ways to cut corners to obtain their license for a given profession, illegal immigrants utilize various methods to get in to the country and obtain residency and citizenship through illegal means.

We must admit that there is no escaping those who violate laws and proper procedures in many areas of life. We can remain diligent and not look the other way when it comes to people who cheat. No matter what they are cheating at. It should not be acceptable behavior, whether in private, public or corporate arenas. Testing can take us just so far but it definitely helps to identify the cheaters from those people who are sacrificing to achieve their goals through ethical means.

You can have an individual's civil and criminal record investigated. You can interview people who know them, you can have surveillance conducted to learn what is really happening in some cases. There are things that can be done to learn more about people. You can use your own judgment.