Drug cheats, beware! - Beijing Olympics to test record number of athletes

GENEVA (AP)

The drug-testing programme at the Beijing Olympics will be the most rigorous anti-doping effort in sports history, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) said yesterday.

The IOC plans to conduct 4,500 tests in Beijing, up from 3,600 in Athens four years ago and 90 per cent more than in Sydney in 2000.

The IOC will also ask Chinese police and security officers to act against suspected doping suppliers before and during the August 8-24 Games.

"The Beijing Games anti-doping effort will be the most comprehensive in sports history," Professor Arne Ljungqvist, chairman of the IOC medical commission said in a conference call.

"The quality of tests are better than ever," he added. "No test is 100 per cent, but we are certainly up to date and state of the art, absolutely."

Ljungqvist dismissed a scientific study published last month which claimed the official test to detect EPO, a blood-boosting hormone, did not work. The Danish study claimed that some people could take EPO without being caught.

Doping controls

"This was not a study designed to evaluate the quality of testing," Ljungqvist said. "The article does not, in my view, have any relation to doping controls in sport."

He said new testing kits to detect human growth hormone have been sent across the world for national and regional anti-doping teams to take out-of-competition samples.

"The test kits for the growth hormone analysis have been distributed and should be working. I hope the testing has begun," Ljungqvist said.

The IOC takes over responsibility for doping controls when the athletes' village opens in Beijing on July 27.

From that day, athletes can be asked to give samples without notice at any time and in any place. National Olympic committees must provide details of each athlete's whereabouts so they can be found.

The doping control programme includes about 700-800 urine tests for EPO and 900 blood tests for HGH.

"We hope that with all the precautions we are taking - expanding the Olympic period where a lot of testing is going on and the expanded programme that we have - we deter people from falling into temptation," said Ljungqvist.