USA Track & Field's Athletes Advisory Committee (AAC) said the lifetime ban should stand even if it was a first offence, in contrast to the two-year ban currently imposed by the ruling International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF).

"The AAC invites the world and the IAAF to impose the first-time steroid offence to be a lifetime ban," the AAC said in a resolution passed unanimously.

AAC vice-president Antonio Pettigrew, a former 400-metre world champion, told Reuters: "We need a procedure where if you do this, you do not compete any more,"

"Now if an athlete tests positive for a steroid, they can come back after two years."

The committee, with about 140 current and past elite athletes present, also voted unanimously to support USATF's proposed "Zero Tolerance" programme, which includes a lifetime ban for steroid users and their coaches.

The proposal will be voted on by USATF's general session on Sunday, having already been endorsed by the body's board of directors. The USATF has been strongly criticised internationally for its past handling of anti-doping cases.

"The world is making us accountable," Pettigrew said. "We need to clean up our act and at the same time we want other countries to be accountable."