Texas may eliminate steroid testing program

AUSTIN, Texas - When Texas began testing tens of thousands of high school athletes for steroids, the goal was to stop teens from taking dangerous performance-enhancing drugs. The death of a 17-year-old baseball player in a Dallas suburb had drawn national attention to the hazard.

But that program could now be axed to save money. Tough economic times are prompting the state along with school districts across the country to pull back from steroid testing just a few years after a series of scandals in professional and amateur sports.

"When steroids was all over the media, everybody said 'We've got to have it,'" said Chris Franz of Sport Safe, an Ohio-based company that conducts recreational drug and steroid testing for hundreds of high schools and districts across the country.