If anyone's interested - can't be fucked starting new thread
Ageing men seek 'youth' fixCameron Houston and Jill Stark
May 10, 2009
MIDDLE-AGED men are increasingly injecting human growth hormones to fight off old age, spending up to $15,000 a year.
Strict government guidelines state it can only be prescribed to children with growth disorders and adults with severe hormone deficiencies. But Australian anti-ageing clinics prescribe it to mostly male patients as young as 35 who want to look good and stay fit.
Users say human growth hormone (HGH) gives them more energy, but specialists warn it can have serious side effects.
Black market sales are also booming with Australian Customs reporting a four-fold increase in seizures of the prohibited import in the last year.
Pharmaceutical companies refuse to disclose sales figures, but a senior industry source says HGH use has soared in the past two years.
Ken Ho, chairman of the department of endocrinology at St Vincent's Hospital, said misuse increases the risk of cancer and diabetes as well as enlargement of the heart and elongation of the jaw.
Professor Ho said anti-ageing clinics were "trying to sell an expectation that if you're 55 and you no longer have the body of a 21-year-old then you can reclaim former glories by taking these drugs … but there is no hormone that can stop ageing."
John Levin, a 77-year-old Melbourne doctor, has been injecting it for 15 years and prescribes it to about 100 patients.
"I feel great, I feel like I'm 50," Dr Levin said. "I don't give it to my patients for aesthetic reasons, I give it purely to get a better quality of life."
HGH is secreted by the brain's pituitary gland and promotes growth during adolescence. The synthetic form of the hormone must be injected daily and costs up to $200 a week.
A body builder and former HGH dealer, who asked not to be named, said demand had shifted to white-collar workers, the nightclub industry and the gay community. He said he supplied an AFL footballer and three professional rugby players.
"When you're training at the gym you feel like you're bouncing off the walls … It also makes your sex drive go through the roof," he said.
Australasian Academy of Anti-Ageing Medicine chairman Bill Anton said HGH is prescribed to less than 10 per cent of patients treated by the academy's 200 members and those who use it are closely monitored.
He concedes tighter regulation is needed. "Growth hormone deserves the same level of respect we give any other hormone," he said.
Gabrielle Caswell, from the Cosmetic Physicians Society of Australia, said demand for HGH soared in 2007 after Hollywood star Sylvester Stallone was caught at Sydney Airport trying to bring 48 vials of the drug into Australia.
