Sir, – News that Chris Froome takes salbutamol (Sport, December 13th), a drug used to treat asthma, makes one wonder at the poor health of international athletes. Most of my acquaintances are under forty years of age, and none of them, not even the unfittest of them take any medications at all, but Froome takes an asthma drug and many other international athletes take asthma drugs,anti-allergy drugs, heart drugs, pain killers and joint injections. I was amazed, for example, when I saw that Maria Sharapova took a drug used to treat heart failure, a disease I normally associate with frail older people. I would happily accept a diagnosis of heart failure if I could play tennis like Sharapova.
It appears that sport, fitness and athleticism are extremely bad for one’s health, and top international athletes seem to need more medications that the average resident of an old folks’ home. Is it time to change our attitude to sport and to recommend that, for the sake of their health, everyone should give up sport and become a couch potato? – Yours, etc,
PAVEL MARIANSKI,
Dungarvan,
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Co Waterford.