Hysteria about anabolic steroids and terrorism was completely unfounded according to toxicology expert.
Khuram Butt, Rachid Redouane and Youssef Zaghba killed 8 individuals and injured 48 others on June 3, 2017 in an incident that has become known as the London Bridge terrorist attack.
The mainstream media at the time reported that the three men displayed “roid rage” with enhanced aggression because they were “juiced up” on anabolic steroids. Obviously, it wasn’t true.
The London Bridge attackers did not really use what we generally consider to be anabolic steroids.
The hysteria over steroids was completely unfounded. We knew at the time that they never used any type of “real” anabolic steroids. The three men had apparently used the over-the-counter supplement known as DHEA according to a February 2018 inquest.
“Analysis of samples taken from the attackers revealed the presence of DHEA, a steroid hormone, above the acceptable physiological range in each of the attackers,” according to testimony by Jonathan Hough QC. “These findings suggest use of the steroid DHEA recently prior to death, i.e. in a period ranging from several hours to days before death. A suitable expert has been instructed to prepare a report on the implications of these findings.”
Over one year later, the British government has found a “suitable expert” to address the effects that the steroid hormone DHEA played in the terrorist attack. The government selected David Cowan, the Head of Department of Forensic Science & Drug Monitoring at King’s College London, to deliver the findings.
“I think it’s highly unlikely that steroid use had any behavioural effect on any of the individuals,” Cowan testified.
Cowan rejected suggestions that the “hyper” and “wild-eyed” appearance of the terrorists was the result of anabolic steroids.
Of course, we already know that steroids, or more accurately DHEA, had no role whatsoever in facilitating the terrorist attack. But it is nice to see a scientific expert succinctly refute all the steroid hysteria.
It is unfortunate that the level of steroid demonization and hysteria is so high that the mainstream media and the general public are so susceptible to believing such misinformation about the effects of steroids.