More must be done to help the rising tide of people who are injecting themselves with steroids, health experts have warned.
Reports suggest the number of people, including teenagers, who use steroids and other performance or image enhancing drugs is "rapidly increasing", the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (Nice) said.
Outreach programmes should be set up in gyms to try to reach this group of drug users, Nice said.
In new guidance, the health authority said that needle and syringe programmes - which were set up in the 1980s and 1990s to stem the spread of HIV - should also make sure that these drug users have the sterile equipment they need to prevent the spread of blood-borne viruses.
Meanwhile, local health bodies need to increase the proportion of these drug users who are tested for HIV, hepatitis B and C and other viruses.
People who use these drugs do not see themselves as having a drug problem, a Nice spokesman said.
In fact, they see themselves as "fit and healthy" despite the fact that people who inject themselves with any type of drug are at a heightened risk of HIV and hepatitis.
Nice warned that anabolic steroid use is "relatively widespread" with an estimated 59,000 people aged 16 to 59 using the drug in England and Wales in the last year.
But Nice said these estimates are "conservative" and said that needle and syringe programmes have reported "rapidly increasing" numbers of steroid users attending their services.
David Rourke, harm reduction lead for Arundel Street Project - a needle and syringe programme in Sheffield, said: "We run a weekly clinic for steroid users but we have people coming through the door on a daily basis, with at least seven new clients a week. We know there are many more people out there who are not using needle and syringe programmes because this group of users do not see themselves as drug users. Traditionally they are more sexually active than users of heroin or crack, so there is more potential for the spread of infections through sex.
Source: Belfast Telegraph, 09/04/14
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