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The International Olympic Committee (IOC) has allowed four international sports federations to conduct blood screenings on athletes during the Beijing Olympics to determine whether any indicators were abnormal before their competitions, the IOC said on Wednesday.

The International Association of Athletics Federations, the International Cycling Union, the International Rowing Federation and the International Modern Pentathlon Union will conduct the screenings until the end of the Games on August 24.

"These screenings will check several blood indicators before the athletes compete," an IOC official told Reuters.

This procedure was first used during the 2006 Turin Winter Olympics with several cross-country skiers being temporarily removed, but not banned, from their competitions and given a specific period for the indicators to come back to normal levels.

If after that period the levels were still abnormal then the IOC proceeded with a doping test.

The same procedure will apply for the Beijing Games, said the IOC, which is in charge of doping throughout the August 8-24 Olympics.

The screenings were first mentioned by IAAF General Secretary Pierre Weiss during a reporters' meeting with federation president Lamine Diack.

DEVELOP DATABASE

Weiss said the screenings would be used to develop a database for athletes.

Former 100 meters world record holder Asafa Powell has complained drugs testers have come calling so often and taken so much blood it could have an impact on his performance.

The IOC has increased the number of doping tests during the Games to 4,500, up from about 3,500 in Athens. It also had urged international federations to conduct extensive testing prior to the Olympics in an attempt to reduce the possibility of drugs cheats making it to Beijing.

Diack also told reporters he hoped disgraced American sprinter Marion Jones would come forward and explain why she used performance-enhancing drugs.

Jones is serving a six-month sentence in a Texas prison for lying to federal agents about her steroid use. She has been stripped of the five medals, three of them gold, she won at the 2000 Sydney Olympics.

(Source: Reuters)