A senior Chinese swimming official said on Saturday that seven Chinese swimmers were tested positive among 1,566 doping tests in 2008.

A total of 1,467 tests, about 32.8 percent more than those in 2007, were conducted on 396 swimmers by the Chinese anti-doping authorities last year, including 1,095 random tests, 237 in-competition tests and 135 blood tests.

According to Li Hua, director of the Chinese Swimming Administrative Center, said at the Chinese Swimming Anti-doping Conference, FINA and WADA also took 10 in-competition and 89 random tests on 99 Chinese swimmers in 2008.

However, 7 positive tests were found from 6 men and 1 women athletes and all of them suffered from Clenbuterol. All swimmers were banned for life.

According to the anti-doping rules of the Chinese Swimming Association, any drug offence will be banned for life.

American hopeful Jessica Hardy was tested positive for Clenbuterol last July just before the Beijing Olympic Games took place and was ruled out of the Olympic team of the United States. Hardy said she did not knowingly or intentionally take any banned substances.

Li Hua said: "We are happy to achieve 1 gold, 3 silver and 2 bronze medals in the Beijing Olympics, but we are more sad about the 7 positive tests in the year of 2008. It is a shame for Chinese swimming as most of the swimmers and coaches work very hard to catch up with the world pace."

"We need to redouble efforts in anti-doping work from now on," Li said.

"I'd like to call on all swimmers to work hard to improve ourselves in the pool and behave cautious on the deck. Let's get off the drugs," said Liu Zige, Olympic champion in the women's 200 meters butterfly.

The Chinese National Swimming Championships is to be held here from April 5-12 with Olympic champion Liu Zige, silver medalists Jiao Liuyang and Zhang Lin competing in their favorite events.

The event will also serve as the qualifying meet for the quadrennial National Games in October in Shandong province.

(Xinhua News Agency April 5, 2009)