Doping threatens Games' credibility

New York -- With the Summer Olympics in Beijing a week away, doping scandals pose a threat to sports careers and the Games' credibility itself, a poll indicates.

A USA Today/Gallup Poll indicated just more than half of American asked said that at least some Olympic athletes in track and field use performance-enhancing drugs.

The survey indicates further that when a track and field athlete sets a world record, more than one-third sports fans say they are suspicious that drugs helped.

More than 20 percent of fans asked say they are suspicious of doping when a swimmer sets a world record.

The results reflect how scandals involving performance-enhancing drugs, notably in Major League Baseball, track and field and professional cycling, have created a credibility gap in the public's mind. U.S. and international sports officials acknowledge it's a growing perception problem. USA Today said.

Doug Logan, the chief executive officer of USA Track and Field, the sport's national governing body, said he wasn't surprised by the poll's findings.

"All sports are under a cloud of suspicion today," he told USA Today. "That's a real-world reaction, unfortunately, to a lot of factual events that have taken place over the last decade or more."

Copyright 2008 by United Press International.