Doping scandal spurred Russians to use meldonia – its sales in 2017 jumped a half times. But do not worry, there is nothing bad in this promotion of doping.
Black PR is also a PR
Until 2016 almost nobody knew meldonia, except professional athletes. Even those who used meldonia, for the most part did not know that this meldonia, because in pharmacies this drug is called in another way – Mildronate.
However, from January 1, 2017 meldoony was outlawed, and the Russians immediately began to have problems. The first and the most scandalous scandal was the disqualification of Maria Sharapova, followed by the victims of mulberry boxer Alexander Povetkin, swimmer Julia Efimova and others.
But the more professional athletes tried to disown the reception meldonia, the more popular he became among amateurs. For the inhabitants of doping has always been associated with something forbidden, potent and dangerous, but it turned out that the miraculous tablets that contributed to the victories of our champions can be freely bought at any pharmacy for 200-300 rubles.
According to the analytical agency DSM Group, since the beginning of the doping scandals, sales of preparations containing meldonia have grown by 54% in Russia. Only in the last six months, the Russians bought more than 2.3 million packs of this substance for a total of more than 1 billion rubles.
As for the rest of the world, nobody knows about the meldonium. Americans and Europeans read about meldonia in the media, but I’ve never seen such a drug with my own eyes, because in the west analogues of this metabolic means are used that are not included in the WADA ban. So the banning meldonia was originally directed specifically against Russia, which, along with former USSR countries, is the main consumer of this drug.
Why do you need meldonium
Pharmacological companies should be grateful to WADA for the coffin of life. Yes, let the professional athletes now have to give up the use of Mildronate, but thanks to the scandal about the facility, the masses learned. Now it is used by ordinary sports, fitness and active lifestyles, believing that meldonium will stimulate the growth of their physical performance, increase endurance and so on.
However, these properties, attributed to the Mildronate, are no more than WADA’s conjectures. In fact, full-scale studies on the effect of the drug on endurance have not been carried out, and those experiments that took place to be did not confirm this influence. The athletes who are caught using the drug say that they used it not to improve the performance, but to accelerate the recovery process after a heavy training.
So those who buy mildronate with the hope of playing tennis, like Maria Sharapova, or become strong and enduring, like Alexander Povetkin, the desired results are unlikely to be achieved, except on the placebo effect. However, we can not say that the reception meldonia does not make sense – even as it has, that’s just the effect of this is not at all what it is customary to expect from doping.
Initially, Mildronate was developed for military needs, and only then its effect was considered useful for sport. Judge for yourself, during active exercises or fighting, soldiers have to face a huge number of loads, and most of the work is done not by the muscles, but by the heart. The heart generally has no time for rest, so heavy loads very much put the main muscle of our body. Meldonium also helps to protect the heart from overloads and helps it to adapt to stressful situations in the future. So meldonium will be extremely useful to any person in whose life there are heavy physical exertions, whether it is a visitor to a fitness club, a loader or a miner.
But that is not all. Meldonium helps the cardiac muscle to adapt to stressful situations not only physically, but also psychologically. Excitement, as everyone knows, leads to rapid heartbeat, which prevents people from concentrating and showing their best qualities. Mildronate helps the heart to adapt to extreme conditions and maintain a steady heartbeat even in stressful situations. So meldonia can be useful even to people far from sports, those who are constantly stressed. Mildronate will help maintain composure in an exciting time and, for example, not to fail important negotiations or public speaking.
Thus, meldonium, although it does not have pronounced anabolic properties, as WADA tries to impart to it, but it brings a tremendous benefit to the body and, in the first place, to our heart. So to be afraid of a loud word “dope” certainly is not necessary. If you are, of course, not a member of the Russian team.