This is a hugely significant decision by the IOC following years of controversy over the participation of transgender and DSD athletes in female competition, and intense debate over how sports should balance fairness and safety with inclusion.
In a reflection of just how sensitive an area of policy this has become, the IOC has traditionally left it to international sports to decide on eligibility criteria for female competition. But in a major shift in policy, all federations will now be expected to follow suit.
A blanket ban on transgender athletes and DSD athletes from women’s sport will be welcomed by many who have long felt that such a move is essential if fairness and safety in the female category is to be preserved.
Supporters say this approach – based on a genetic test – has recently been successfully employed in athletics and boxing, and is a reliable, confidential and proportionate approach that has the backing of sports scientists, along with the vast majority of athletes.
They also say this method is more humane than requiring transgender or DSD athletes to suppress their natural testosterone levels, and will avoid the intense media scrutiny that some athletes have been subjected to.
Opponents remain concerned, however, that the approach is invasive, and that there is a risk of accidental contamination and a potential false positive.
This month a group of academics called sex testing a “backwards step and a harmful anachronism” in a report submitted to the British Journal of Sports Medicine, and that testing violates the human rights of athletes and could create stigma and psychological distress.
They said it was “a simplistic way of reducing a characteristic to a single gene, which does not reflect the complex nature of sex”.
The IOC used the SRY gene test in the 1980s but, after a number of ‘false positives’, and fears that female athletes were being punished for natural variations, sex verification tests were abolished in the 1990s.
Now, under mounting pressure, sport’s most powerful body has embarked on a new approach, and it will be fascinating to see if it now faces any legal challenges.
