In a candid interview, Doug Logan, the chief executive of USA Track & Field (USATF), also spoke of his admiration for the controversial life ban used by the British Olympic Association (BOA), accused other sports of “burying the problem” and laid the ground rules for Justin Gatlin's controversial return to the sport next year.

Logan, who drug-tested his staff when he became Major League Soccer's first commissioner, said: “You can get whatever you want in any gym in the United States. It's like a candy store. Nine-year-old kids know the pharmacology and know how to get access to it. We need to develop a collective national conscience and bring about a culture change.

“In the past there has not been the determination to clean it up. People said it was an aberration. Then when the numbers got bigger the apologists still said it was only 4 per cent. Sports management is a very defensive profession and wants to protect the image. For too long it's been an exercise in defensiveness - well, we have to admit the magnitude of the problem.”

Where the United States was once seen as the root of much evil, the post-Balco landscape has slowly started to change; the cynical explanation for the men's dismal showing in last year's Olympics in Beijing was that they were off drugs. Logan, who took his job just before the Games, knows the problem will never be solved and that, for an issue that appears black and white, there are many grey areas. Hence, he applauds the BOA ban that prevented Dwain Chambers from running in Beijing, but talks of America as a “redemptive society”.

He also has no problem with the return of Gatlin, the 2004 Olympic 100 metres champion who has twice failed drugs tests. “There has to be a price you pay in coming back,” Logan said, citing three “tolls”. “If you took money unfairly there has to be restitution. Secondly, there has to be some form of community service that helps our battle, participation in clinics and advocacy, so people can learn from your mistakes. Thirdly, a key ingredient is to come clean in what they did and who they did it with. 'I didn't know it was happening' is no longer acceptable.”

To date that has been Gatlin's response, blaming his second positive drugs test in 2006 on sabotage. So had Gatlin, who this year settled his civil suit against USATF and other agencies regarding his first positive test, been more candid in private? “Yes,” Logan said. “We have a statement from Justin which comes very close to what we are looking for with regards to what occurred. Those three elements will be there.” Rules regarding dopers returning to action and coaching are due to be released this summer.

The return of Gatlin, 27, will be a huge event. He might have had a life ban but for cutting a deal with the anti-doping agencies and last year had a career-ending eight-year ban halved by the American Arbitration Association. Now he says he and not Usain Bolt should be the world No1.

The “redemptive society” notwithstanding, Logan said there had been “discussions” with regards to adopting a BOA-type ban. “I admire what has been done in Britain regards sanctions and wish our sanctions were steeper,” he said. “But you also have to remember that, on a sport-by-sport basis, we have the stiffest penalties. A first offence in baseball is 50 games, which sounds a lot but is two months. A first offence in football is four games. In athletics it's two years - that's career-changing, possibly termination.

“There's an issue of drugs in just about every sport. That's the reality. In team sports, well, managers are still happy to bury the issue. You have to accept it, then fight it.”

- The Project 30 Task Force, including athletes such as Carl Lewis and Deena Kastor, delivered its verdict on US athletics this year. It handed Logan a 69-page report that claimed athletes did not conduct themselves in a professional manner and that spending $1million (about £650,000) on the relay had proved a waste of money.