Barry Bonds, the San Francisco Giants' love-him-or-hate-him home-run king, connected with home run number 756 against the Washington Nationals this week, surpassing Hank Aaron’s legendary 755 and securing a historic niche in baseball’s record books for lifetime home runs. But Bonds already holds a different niche in baseball history – or perhaps in the history of all athletics – as the most notorious alleged consumer of performance enhancing drugs in professional sports. Whether Bonds did or didn’t use the banned drugs is another story. But anabolic steroids are so commonly used by athletes that it’s only a matter of time before a star athlete decides to come clean and handle his drug abuse by checking into a facility for a thorough drug detox.

Anabolic steroids are used by athletes to build lean muscle mass. Even though banned by most pro sport leagues because of the unfair advantage they confer on users, the drugs remain popular. Steroids deliver numerous unpleasant side-effects, as well as some which pose threats to health and even to life. Also, the addictive properties of steroids add to the argument by sports fans and media for better controls and stronger penalties for abusers.

Along with more frequent testing and tougher penalties, mandatory drug detox programs might not be a bad idea. Rules that include “you’re out of all games until you successfully detox" would accomplish a couple of positive results:

1.Mandatory drug detox would help deter athletes from dabbling with steroids or any other banned performance enhancing drugs.

2.Mandatory drug detox would help steroid abusers get clean and stay clean, enhancing their health and the health of their sport.

3.Another very good reason for someone who’s been abusing steroids to use a drug detox program is because withdrawal from steroids is the main cause of unpredictable violence – known as ‘roid rage’ among athletes. Treatment should involve the best, most modern drug detox and drug rehab procedures available.

The National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) has cited aggression, paranoid jealousy, extreme irritability, delusions, impaired judgment and feelings of invincibility as steroid abuse side effects. Others include liver tumors, cancer, acne, shrinking of the testicles, reduced sperm count and infertility, male development of breasts, increased risk of prostate cancer, and stunted growth in teenagers not yet fully grown. To avoid these problems, people abusing anabolic steroids should consider drug detox.

Although he’s been a key figure in the BALCO steroids scandal, Bonds has never failed a steroid test. And although he is under investigation for perjury by a federal grand jury regarding his testimony in the BALCO case, he still has not been indicted.

So the jury is still out on America’s infamous poster boy for steroid abuse. Nevertheless we cannot deny he’s one of the most talented baseball players to come along in a long time. Whether or not Bonds used performance-enhancing drugs to morph from just a great hitter into a positively terrifying one, he is now the all-time home-run ruler, and we’re stuck with it.

Meanwhile, any athlete yearning to make the record-books by beefing up on steroids should never forget that researchers at Yale found long-term steroid abuse causes all the classic signs of drug addiction – craving it, inability to stop using it, and dangerous withdrawal symptoms. A drug detox programand a successful drug rehab are the only solution to help steroid abusers kick their habits and clean up themselves, and the sports we love.