All participants at the Games are undergoing daily testing for COVID-19 as part of a series of rigorous countermeasures put in place by organisers.

But Snowboarding Germany President Michael Hölz has raised question marks over the system, claiming test results could be manipulated.

"I doubt that we will see fair play in the competitions in China," Hölz told a Snowboarding Germany podcast.

"It is relatively easy with [COVID-19] testing, someone can later say, 'We’re sorry, it was a false positive'."

Hölz, who previously worked for the German National Anti-Doping Agency, compared the doping system with COVID-19 tests, suggesting results could be tampered with to ensure key athletes are unable to compete at the Games.

"We know how the topic of doping is dealt with in countries with such constitutions," he said. 

"A comparison between doping and COVID-19 tests is absolutely in order."

Hölz’s comments come after Wolfgang Maier, Alpine director of the German Ski Association, alleged he felt the COVID-19 testing system in Beijing was being controlled almost "arbitrarily" prior to the Winter Olympics, which are due to open on February 4.

Huang Chun, deputy director general of the Beijing 2022 Organising Committee Pandemic Prevention and Control Office, has hit back at the claims made by the two German officials.

"We will ensure there is no room for error when it comes to COVID-19 testing data and results," Huang told the state-controlled China Daily.

"Our testing laboratories are run by professional medical workers who received strict training prior to the Games.

"The results produced by such laboratories can well be trusted.

"It's unnecessary for people to have any doubts."

Huang added that athletes concerned by COVID-19 tests can put forward their cases to the Beijing 2022 Medical Expert Panel for review.

Organisers of the Games have implemented a "closed-loop management system" in a bid to shut out coronavirus.

Those receiving a positive result from airport testing followed by a negative confirmation test will be required to receive another negative result from an additional test prior to entering the closed loop.

The measure has been established in order to avoid people being released with a false negative from the confirmatory test.

Athletes and Games participants who test positive and are asymptomatic will be discharged from isolation once they have two consecutive negative polymerase chain reaction (PCR) test results 24 hours apart.

Dr Brian McCloskey, chair of the Beijing 2022 Medical Expert Panel, has claimed that the testing process in Beijing is "robust" and "reliable".

"It is the same type of PCR test that is used the world over," formerly the director of gobal health for Public Health England and who was involved in health planning for the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games in London. 

"For the Games, the test is set at a very sensitive level because what we want to achieve is not to get Omicron into the closed-loop system.

"Extra reagents and different gene targets have been brought in to ensure that, although we set it very sensitively, we can increase the specificity to exclude false positives."