Sinclair C J, Geiger J D
Department of Pharmacology and Therapeutics, Faculty of Medicine, University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, Canada.
J Sports Med Phys Fitness. 2000 Mar;40(1):71-9.
Caffeine is the most widely ingested psychoactive drug in the world. As many know, chronic use of caffeine leads to dependence, tolerance, drug craving, and upon abrupt cessation unpleasant withdrawal symptoms. Thus, caffeine fulfills pharmacological criteria by which agents are classified as drugs of abuse. Nevertheless, its use is legal and only at high, but readily attainable, levels is it banned from sport. Its use is widespread by athletes as young as 11 years of age who are seeking athletic advantage over fellow competitors. It is likely that its use will not decline any time soon because it is inexpensive, readily available, medically quite safe, socially acceptable, and by most measures legal. However, at levels allowed in sport, caffeine through its wide-ranging physiological and psychological effects increases endurance in well-trained athletes. If the goal of drug-testing and education programs in sport is to protect the health of athletes, prevent unfair advantage (cheating) and encourage ethical behavior then it seems obvious that the allowable levels of caffeine ingestion should be decreased. The alternative is to continue with policies designed largely to punish only those that get caught.
咖啡因是世界上摄入最为广泛的精神活性药物。众所周知，长期使用咖啡因会导致成瘾、耐受性、药物渴望，而且突然停药会出现令人不适的戒断症状。因此，咖啡因符合将药物归类为滥用药物的药理学标准。然而，它的使用是合法的，只有在达到较高但很容易达到的剂量时才会被禁止用于体育赛事。11岁的运动员就普遍使用它来寻求超越竞争对手的体育优势。它的使用不太可能很快减少，因为它价格低廉、容易获得、医学上相当安全、社会可接受，而且在大多数情况下是合法的。然而，在体育赛事允许的剂量水平下，咖啡因通过其广泛的生理和心理作用，能提高训练有素的运动员的耐力。如果体育赛事中药物检测和教育项目的目标是保护运动员的健康、防止不公平优势（作弊）并鼓励道德行为，那么显然应该降低咖啡因的允许摄入量。另一种选择是继续执行主要旨在惩罚那些被抓到的人的政策。
