Arne Gunnar Gunnarsson Ljungqvist, born April 23, 1931 in Stockholm

Stockholm

Stockholm is the capital and the largest city of Sweden and constitutes the most populated urban area in Scandinavia. Stockholm is the most populous city in Sweden, with a population of 851,155 in the municipality , 1.37 million in the urban area , and around 2.1 million in the metropolitan area...

 is a Swedish

Sweden

Sweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden borders with Norway and Finland and is connected to Denmark by a bridge-tunnel across the Öresund....

 medical researcher and sports personality. Ljungqvist is a member of the International Olympic Committee

International Olympic Committee

The International Olympic Committee is an international corporation based in Lausanne, Switzerland, created by Pierre de Coubertin on 23 June 1894 with Demetrios Vikelas as its first president...

 (IOC), chairman of IOC's Medical Commission, and vice chairman of the World Anti-Doping Agency

World Anti-Doping Agency

The World Anti-Doping Agency , , is an independent foundation created through a collective initiative led by the International Olympic Committee . It was set up on November 10, 1999 in Lausanne, Switzerland, as a result of what was called the "Declaration of Lausanne", to promote, coordinate and...

 (WADA).

Biography

In his youth, Arne Ljungqvist was active in athletics and competed in high jump

High jump

The high jump is a track and field athletics event in which competitors must jump over a horizontal bar placed at measured heights without the aid of certain devices in its modern most practiced format; auxiliary weights and mounds have been used for assistance; rules have changed over the years....

. He participated in Swedish athletics team in the 1952 Summer Olympics

1952 Summer Olympics

The 1952 Summer Olympics, officially known as the Games of the XV Olympiad, were an international multi-sport event held in Helsinki, Finland in 1952. Helsinki had been earlier given the 1940 Summer Olympics, which were cancelled due to World War II...

 after having been the Swedish high jump champion earlier the same year. He then left competitive sports to finish his medical training.

Academic career

After his medical studies, Ljungqvist was appointed professor, 1972–1983, and has made medical research in the fields of renal and cardiovascular diseases and, later, oncology at the Karolinska Institute. In the last years of his academic career, he was rector of the Swedish School of Sport and Health Sciences in Stockholm from 1992 to 1996, an institution which has close collaboration with the Karolinska Institute in the field of sports medicine. He ended his professional career as President of the Swedish Cancer Society, 1992-2001.

Sports official

In the 1970s, he took on several roles as a sports official, first on the national level in Sweden and soon after in international organizations. He became a council member of the Swedish Athletic Association in 1970, and was its president from 1973 to 1981. He became a council member of the umbrella organization for Swedish sport, the Swedish Sports Confederation

Swedish Sports Confederation

The Swedish Sports Confederation is the umbrella organisation of the Swedish sports movement. Through its member organisations, it has three million members in 22 000 clubs. The Confederation was formed in 1903...

, in 1975, and was its president from 1991 to 2001. His international career as a sports official started when he became a council member of the International Association of Athletics Federations

International Association of Athletics Federations

The International Association of Athletics Federations is the international governing body for the sport of athletics. It was founded in 1912 at its first congress in Stockholm, Sweden by representatives from 17 national athletics federations as the International Amateur Athletics Federation...

 (IAAF) in 1976. He was one of IAAF's vice presidents from 1981 to 1999, and IAAF's senior vice president 1999-2007.

In 1994, he was elected a member of the IOC, and became the chairman of its Medical Commission in 2003.

Sports medicine and anti-doping work

Drawing benefit of his combined medical and sports background, Arne Ljungqvist was president of the Swedish Council of Sports Research from 1980 to 1993. In 1987, he became a member of IOC's Medical Commission, which has chaired since 2003. In these positions, Ljungqvist took notice of the increasing problems of doping

Doping (sport)

The use of performance-enhancing drugs in sport is commonly referred to by the term "doping", particularly by those organizations that regulate competitions. The use of performance enhancing drugs is mostly done to improve athletic performance. This is why many sports ban the use of performance...

in competitive sports, and its health consequences, and became a leading figure in anti-doping work. He became a board member of WADA when it was created in 1999, and later its vice chairman. He is also chairman of WADA's Health, Medical & Research Committee. Since 2008 he is the vice President of WADA.

In 2001 he received the KTH Grand Prize and in 2009 he was awarded the Sports Academy Honorary Award.

Sources