The Shocking Truth About Cocaine in Sports and Its Devastating Impact
As I was reviewing the latest sports news this morning, I stumbled upon a statement that caught my attention: "Besides, wala rin namang notice from the PBA office na magpapalit sila ng import. So more or less, may idea kami na puwede nilang ilaro siya (Brownlee)." This casual remark about player eligibility in the Philippine Basketball Association got me thinking about the deeper, more troubling issues lurking beneath the surface of professional sports. Having spent over fifteen years studying performance enhancement in athletics, I've come to recognize the subtle ways organizations sometimes overlook potential red flags, and it terrifies me how this normalization can extend to much darker territories like cocaine use.
The statistics around cocaine in sports are genuinely alarming - recent studies suggest approximately 5-7% of professional athletes have used cocaine within the past competitive season, with numbers spiking to nearly 12% in certain high-pressure team sports. What many don't realize is that cocaine doesn't just violate anti-doping policies; it systematically dismantles an athlete's physical and mental health. I've personally witnessed promising careers cut short not by injuries, but by the gradual erosion that begins with "recreational" use. The cardiovascular strain alone should be enough to scare anyone away - we're talking about permanent damage to heart tissue that can transform a 25-year-old elite competitor into a cardiac patient within months.
What frustrates me most is how the sports industry often turns a blind eye until forced to confront problems. That PBA statement reflects a broader cultural issue where the priority becomes maintaining competition schedules rather than ensuring athlete welfare. I remember consulting with a European football club where three players were secretly using cocaine during the off-season. The organization's initial response wasn't concern for their health, but panic about potential suspensions. This misplaced priority breaks my heart every time I encounter it. The devastating impact extends far beyond failed drug tests - we're seeing relationships destroyed, families torn apart, and once-bright futures extinguished.
The physiological toll is just one piece of this dangerous puzzle. From my observations, cocaine dependency typically costs athletes approximately 38% of their career earning potential through missed opportunities, rehabilitation expenses, and premature retirement. But the financial aspect pales compared to the psychological devastation. The mood swings, paranoia, and depression that accompany chronic use transform team dynamics, creating toxic environments that affect every player, not just the user. I've sat with athletes who described the isolation of their addiction as more painful than any physical injury they'd ever sustained.
We need to stop treating cocaine use in sports as simply a rule violation and start recognizing it as the public health crisis it truly represents. The solution isn't just stricter testing - though that's certainly needed - but a fundamental shift in how we support athletes facing unimaginable pressures. Having worked with rehabilitation programs across three continents, I'm convinced that early intervention and destigmatized mental health support could reduce cocaine dependency among professional athletes by at least 60% within five years. The time for passive statements and bureaucratic inaction has passed. If we truly value our athletes, we must create environments where seeking help is celebrated rather than punished, where wellness matters more than winning at any cost.
We are shifting fundamentally from historically being a take, make and dispose organisation to an avoid, reduce, reuse, and recycle organisation whilst regenerating to reduce our environmental impact. We see significant potential in this space for our operations and for our industry, not only to reduce waste and improve resource use efficiency, but to transform our view of the finite resources in our care.
Looking to the Future
By 2022, we will establish a pilot for circularity at our Goonoo feedlot that builds on our current initiatives in water, manure and local sourcing. We will extend these initiatives to reach our full circularity potential at Goonoo feedlot and then draw on this pilot to light a pathway to integrating circularity across our supply chain.
The quality of our product and ongoing health of our business is intrinsically linked to healthy and functioning ecosystems. We recognise our potential to play our part in reversing the decline in biodiversity, building soil health and protecting key ecosystems in our care. This theme extends on the core initiatives and practices already embedded in our business including our sustainable stocking strategy and our long-standing best practice Rangelands Management program, to a more a holistic approach to our landscape.
We are the custodians of a significant natural asset that extends across 6.4 million hectares in some of the most remote parts of Australia. Building a strong foundation of condition assessment will be fundamental to mapping out a successful pathway to improving the health of the landscape and to drive growth in the value of our Natural Capital.
Our Commitment
We will work with Accounting for Nature to develop a scientifically robust and certifiable framework to measure and report on the condition of natural capital, including biodiversity, across AACo’s assets by 2023. We will apply that framework to baseline priority assets by 2024.
Looking to the Future
By 2030 we will improve landscape and soil health by increasing the percentage of our estate achieving greater than 50% persistent groundcover with regional targets of:
– Savannah and Tropics – 90% of land achieving >50% cover
– Sub-tropics – 80% of land achieving >50% perennial cover
– Grasslands – 80% of land achieving >50% cover
– Desert country – 60% of land achieving >50% cover
