More than 4,500 drug tests are being conducted from July 27 to Aug. 24 -- 25 percent more than at the 2004 Athens Games and 90 percent more than at Sydney in 2000.
Jacques Rogge, the International Olympic Committee president, said he expects the number of failed drug tests to rise to 40 in Beijing from 26 in Athens. Chinese officials said they weren't concerned about numbers.
``It's not important how many positive cases will be found, the key is how resolute we are to clean it up,'' Zhao Jian, deputy director of the China Anti-Doping Agency, said at a press conference in Beijing.
China has ramped up testing of its own athletes to try to avoid the embarrassment of positive tests in its first Olympics as host. It tripled the number of tests on top athletes and, in the first half of 2008, eight positives were returned from more than 5,000 tests.
``As an Olympic hosting country, anti-doping testing on our own athletes is one of our most important jobs this year,'' Zhao said.
China banned two national team athletes for life, swimmer Ouyang Kunpeng and wrestler Luo Meng. Six others were barred from next year's National Games after failing doping tests.
``The Beijing Olympic Games is just around the corner, so China will step up education and management of athletes and coaches to resolutely avoid any more drug cases,'' said Jiang Zhixue, a director at the General Administration of Sport, today.
The Olympic drug-testing program will be carried out by the Chinese Anti-Doping Agency, working with the IOC and the World Anti-Doping Agency.
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