With the Winter Olympics in full swing in Salt Lake City, the thorny issue of athletes accidentally taking banned substances in legally available supplements has reared its head once more.

In response to this, the organisation ConsumerLab.com has announced that it is to launch an Athletic Banned Substances Screening Programme to test dietary supplements, performance enhancement products, and other nutrition products for substances that could cause disqualification of athletes from Olympic and other competitions.

ConsumerLab.com claims this will be the first comprehensive programme to focus on supplements, since current tests focus on body fluids from athletes. The ConsumerLab.com screening programme will include testing for 63 banned substances, including stimulants, narcotics, anabolic agents, diuretics, masking agents and beta-blockers based on the Olympic Movement Anti-Doping Code.

"With uncertainty surrounding the quality of supplements and the possible severe implications of tainted products for athletes and sports associations, it has clearly become necessary for ConsumerLab.com to offer banned substances screening as an adjunct to its existing programme," said Tod Cooperman, president of ConsumerLab.com.

ConsumerLab.com has called on manufacturers, sports associations and others to participate in the programme, for which there is a testing fee. The identities of products that pass the testing may be posted at www.consumerlab.com