The Search for a Needle in a Haystack — Evidence of Anabolic Abuse in GDR Sport

HISTORICAL DATA PROCESSING

For a feature-length documentary about a female GDR athlete and Olympic medal winner (Moscow 1980), a long-term investigation into physical abuse in GDR sport was developed, which systematically analyzed medical records and files from the GDR Ministry for State Security (MfS). The athlete was unable to prove that she had been given anabolic steroids. The search for evidence went on for several years. In addition, the working hypothesis was examined as to whether female athletes in her training group were involved in illegal drug trials of the experimental substance STS-646 without their knowledge, which was administered without clinical approval. With the help of the MfS file research, the doctors and scientific departments involved at Berlin hospital complex Charite could be reconstructed in order to then examine the plausibility of the athlete's suspicions more closely with contemporary witnesses, historians and researchers in FRG and the GDR. A chance discovery during the removal of mountains of files on the site of the former high-performance center („Sportforum") Hohenschönhausen gave the athlete final certainty that she had not imagined the “forced doping”. The doctors and trainers involved were not prosecuted.