What was the official name given to the decades-long program of performance-enhancing drugs given to East German athletes called?
The German Democratic Republic (GDR), commonly known as East Germany (German: Deutsche Demokratische Republik or DDR) conducted a decades-long program of coercive administration and distribution of performance-enhancing drugs, such as testosterone and other anabolic steroids to its elite athletes for the purpose of bolstering the state's image and prestige by winning medals in international championships (such as the Olympics), known officially as State Plan 14.25. The drug regimens, given either with or without the knowledge of the athletes, resulted in victories in international competitions, including the Olympic Games. East Germany had been a pioneering state in doping, so much that it was considered to be the inventor of doping.
Systematic doping of athletes ended with the fall of communism in East Germany in 1989, before German reunification a year later. Many former athletes suffer from health problems related to steroid consumption.
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