The sport of wrestling is highly competitive.Unlike other sports like football, wrestling is more of an individual sport rather than a team effort.Teams are divided up into fourteen weight classes, starting with 103 pounds and topping at 285 pounds.Wrestlers must weigh in before a match, making sure they are under the maximum weight for their individual class.Then the athletes in corresponding weight classes from opposing teams wrestle six minute matches.  Many athletes think by wrestling down a weight class or two from their natural body weight they will have a competitive edge over their opponents.This competitive edge, though, is costing these wrestlers their health and occasionally their lives.

The physical aspects of the sport have outwardly been shown for years.  "Cauliflower ear" (where the ear becomes bruised, hardened and deformed from repeated contact) was a problem taken care of through the requirement of headgear.  Now Wrestling faces a new problem, a silent dilemma continually building force.  Extreme, unhealthy weight loss is becoming more and more prevalent among high school and college wrestlers. 

Despite warnings from the American College of Sports Medicine and the American Medical Association, medical problems associated with rapid weight loss (''weight cutting'') among wrestlers have continued.
(Physician and Sports Medicine. Pg. 80)

It could be cured but nobody is willing to do something about it.  Everyone wants to see a good performance, and until people stop associating weight loss with competition and a good performance, the sport of wrestling will continue on its dangerous path to extinction.