EXPOSURE TO ANABOLIC-ANDROGENIC STEROIDS SHORTENS LIFE-SPAN OF MALE-MICE

Adult male laboratory mice were exposed for 6 months to a combination of four anabolic-androgenic steroids of the kinds and at the relative levels to which human athletes and body builders expose themselves. Th e four steroids included testosterone, two 17-alkylated steroids, and an ester, and they were given at doses that totaled either 5 or 20 tim es normal androgenic maintenance levels for mice. By the time the surv ivors were 20 months old (1 yr after the termination of steroid exposu re), 52% of the mice given the high dose of steroids had died compared with 35% of the mice given the low dose and only 12% of the control m ice given no exogenous hormones (P < 0.001). Autopsy of the steroid-tr eated mice typically revealed tumors in the liver or kidney, other kin ds of damage to these two organs, broadly invase lymphosarcomas, or he art damage, and usually more than one of these conditions. It can be c oncluded that the life span of male mice is decreased dramatically by exposing them for 6 months to the kinds and relative levels of anaboli c steroids used by many athletes and body builders.