Steroids and the ‘silent’ cancer plaguing the manosphere

The patient, to look at him, was in the prime of his life: in his late thirties, fit and toned from hours spent in the gym. 

But the scans told a different story. Growing on his liver was a malignant tumour the size of a bowling ball. The obsession that had given him his chiselled physique had handed him a death sentence. The patient — like thousands of other gymgoers in the UK — had been taking anabolic steroids. 

The cancer was inoperable. There was nothing his doctors could do for him.

“His life expectancy is probably about six or seven months,” said Stephen Wigmore, regius professor of clinical surgery at the University of Edinburgh. This was not the first young man whom Wigmore, who is also the head of surgery at the Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh, had treated for liver cancer after heavy steroid use.

He said the illegal trade in steroids in gyms, taken by predominantly young men pursuing the ideal of a masculine body, had created a “silent killer”. And he said this was encouraged by social media and the “manosphere” — a loose collection of online influencers and chat forums pushing misogynistic views and a new idea of masculinity.

It is hard to tell the scale of the threat. “We are not talking about an epidemic,” Wigmore said. “This is very rare, but I’ve seen two cases in the last six months. And across the country each liver unit is seeing small numbers of young men in similar situations.

“The irony of taking drugs to make oneself more beautiful but ultimately shortening one’s life is inescapable,” he said, comparing the phenomenon to the obsession of some young women with risky cosmetic surgery such as Brazilian butt lifts.

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Source: The Times, 18 April 2026