08-24-06

BEIJING — Students at a sports school in northeastern China were caught using performance-enhancing drugs in a doping raid, state media said Wednesday.

It's the latest scandal to hit the country's track and field athletes.

Officials from China's Olympic Committee Anti-Doping Commission and other high-level sports administrators paid a surprise visit Aug. 8 to a training base used by the Liaoning Anshan Athletics School, the official Xinhua News Agency said.

"They found appalling evidence of collective doping," Xinhua said. "Officials caught school staff injecting teenage students with banned substances and confiscated illegal drugs, including erythropoietin (EPO) and testosterone."

Hypodermic needles also were found in the room of headmaster Shao Huibin, Xinhua said.