Illegal Steroid-Based Muscle-Enhancing Supplements Are Easily Obtainable Online

Steroid compounds banned by the federal government have crept back into muscle-building dietary supplements and are available online at such retail outlets as Amazon.com, according to press reports. Two representatives of the nonprofit Anti-Doping Research Group of Los Angeles, Calif., tested four muscle-building supplements they  purchased and found illegal steroids in three of them. Amazon has since removed several of the products, manufactured by Competitive Edge Labs, from the site. According to Don Caitlin, CEO of Anti-Doping Research Group, the purchase and testing effort was not meant to target Amazon, but to show the wide availability of  adulterated products. "Our interest is in protecting the unsuspecting consumer from being able to buy these products, take them without knowing what they really are, and put themselves in the hospital," Caitlin said.