Promotion and distribution of growth hormones for non-medical purposes was criticized by Dr. Thomas T. Perls, an associate professor of medicine at Boston University School of Medicine in response to a recently released report by the American Medical Association’s (AMA) Council on Science and Public Health.

Dr. Perls appreciated the courage displayed by the AMA in assessing risks and benefits of DHEA, estrogen, growth hormone, and testosterone for preventing anti-aging, in an editorial appearing in the Future Medicine journal Aging Health.

From Sciencedaily.com:

There have always been nostrums and potions peddled for eternal youth. Most recently these have been what some entrepreneurs call “bio-identical” or “all-natural” hormones. What they mean by these terms varies from substances made from vegetables — such as soy or yams, which some claim have estrogen-like effects to, more commonly, drugs that are exactly the same as hormones prescribed by endocrinologists for specific diseases. Dr. Perls remarked: “The terms bio-identical or all-natural, particularly in the case of the drugs prescribed by endocrinologists, misleadingly convey a sense of safety to the gullible customer. Arsenic is all-natural to, and it even has some medical uses, but it is anything but safe.”

“The AMA’s review of the risks and benefits of these hormones in the setting of anti-aging and athletic enhancement is very important given its inclusion of the consensus and position statements of the key professional medical societies as well as the federal agencies that guard public health.” states Dr. Perls in the editorial.

The marketing of hormones, particularly growth hormone and anabolic steroids, was denounced by Dr. Perls for anti-aging.