{"id":9932,"date":"2026-03-26T17:24:06","date_gmt":"2026-03-26T17:24:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/news\/9932\/"},"modified":"2026-03-26T17:24:06","modified_gmt":"2026-03-26T17:24:06","slug":"transgender-women-athletes-banned-from-olympics-womens-events-by-ioc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/news\/9932\/","title":{"rendered":"Transgender women athletes banned from Olympics women’s events by IOC"},"content":{"rendered":"

GENEVA (AP) \u2014 Transgender women athletes are now excluded from women\u2019s events at the Olympics after the IOC agreed to a new eligibility policy on Thursday which aligns with U.S. President Donald Trump\u2019s executive order<\/a> on sports ahead of the 2028 Los Angeles Games.<\/p>\n

\u201cEligibility for any female category event at the Olympic Games or any other IOC event, including individual and team sports, is now limited to biological females,\u201d the International Olympic Committee said, to be determined by a mandatory gene test once in an athlete\u2019s career.<\/p>\n

It is unclear how many, if any, transgender women are competing at an Olympic level. No woman who transitioned from being born male competed at the 2024 Paris Summer Games, though weightlifter Laurel Hubbard<\/a> did at the Tokyo Olympics in 2021 without winning a medal. <\/p>\n

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The eligibility policy that will apply from the L.A. Olympics in July 2028 \u201cprotects fairness, safety and integrity in the female category,\u201d the IOC said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is not retroactive and does not apply to any grassroots or recreational sports programs,\u201d said the IOC, whose Olympic Charter<\/a> states that access to play sport is a human right.<\/p>\n

After an executive board meeting, the International Olympic Committee published a 10-page policy document<\/a> which also restricts female athletes such as two-time Olympic champion runner Caster Semenya with medical conditions known as differences in sex development, or DSD. <\/p>\n

The IOC and its president, Kirsty Coventry, have wanted a clear policy instead of continuing to advise sports\u2019 governing bodies who previously have drafted their own rules.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt the Olympic Games, even the smallest margins can be the difference between victory and defeat,\u201d Coventry, a two-time Olympic gold medalist in swimming, said in a statement. \u201cSo, it is absolutely clear that it would not be fair for biological males to compete in the female category.\u201d<\/p>\n

She set up a review of \u201cprotecting the female category\u201d as one of her first big decisions last June as the first woman to lead the Olympic body<\/a> in its 132-year history.<\/p>\n

Female eligibility was a strong theme in a seven-candidate IOC election<\/a> last year \u2014 held after a furor around women\u2019s boxing<\/a> in Paris \u2014 when Coventry\u2019s main rivals pledged a stronger policy to leading on the issue.<\/p>\n

Before the 2024 Paris Olympics, three top-tier sports \u2014 track and field<\/a>, swimming and cycling \u2014 excluded transgender women who had been through male puberty. Semenya, who was assigned female at birth in South Africa and has testosterone levels higher than the typical female range, won a European Court of Human Rights judgment<\/a> in her years-long legal challenge to track and field\u2019s rules which did not overturn them.<\/p>\n

Performance advantage from testosterone<\/p>\n

The IOC document details its research that being born male gives physical advantages that a working group of experts believes are retained.<\/p>\n

\u201cMales experience three significant testosterone peaks: In utero, in mini-puberty of infancy and beginning in adolescent puberty through adulthood,\u201d the document said.<\/p>\n

It added this gives males \u201cindividual sex-based performance advantages in sports and events that rely on strength, power and\/or endurance.\u201d<\/p>\n

The IOC said its research included \u201cin-depth individual interviews with impacted athletes from around the world.\u201d<\/p>\n

The expert group agreed the current gene test is \u201cthe most accurate and least intrusive method currently available.\u201d The saliva, cheek swab or blood sample screens for \u201cthe SRY gene, a segment of DNA typically found on the Y chromosome that initiates male sex development in utero and indicates the presence of testes\/testicles.\u201d<\/p>\n

Still, the mandatory gender screening \u2014 already conducted by the governing bodies of track and field, skiing<\/a> and boxing \u2014 is likely to be criticized by human rights experts and activist groups.<\/p>\n

Women\u2019s boxing champions<\/p>\n

One of the two women\u2019s boxing gold medalists at the center of the gender controversy in Paris, Lin Yu-ting of Taiwan, has passed her gene test<\/a> and can return to competition, the World Boxing governing body said last week.<\/p>\n

The other Olympic boxing champion, Imane Khelif of Algeria, told CNN last month<\/a> she would take a gene test to be eligible for the L.A. Olympics. She is reportedly preparing for a professional bout next month in Paris.<\/p>\n

The IOC document published on Thursday said the male performance advantage over biological women was \u201c10-12% in most running and swimming events,\u201d at least 20% in \u201cmost throwing and jumping events\u201d but \u201ccan be greater than 100%\u201d for explosive power events including \u201cpunching sports.\u201d<\/p>\n

Trump\u2019s executive order <\/p>\n

In the U.S., President Trump signed the executive order \u201cKeeping Men Out of Women\u2019s Sports\u201d in February last year, and pledged to deny visas to some athletes attempting to compete at the L.A Olympics. The order also threatened to \u201crescind all funds\u201d from organizations that allowed transgender athletes to take part in women\u2019s sports.<\/p>\n

Within months the U.S. Olympic body updated its guidance<\/a> to national sports bodies citing an obligation to comply with the White House.<\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

AP Winter Olympics at https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/milan-cortina-2026-winter-olympics<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"GENEVA (AP) \u2014 Transgender women athletes are now excluded from women\u2019s events at the Olympics after the IOC…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":9933,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[4512,61,7191,38,68,6269,50,8,7194,7190,7193,57,7192,1251,9,7189,1199,7,106],"class_list":{"0":"post-9932","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-top-stories","8":"tag-2026-winter-olympics","9":"tag-ap-top-news","10":"tag-caster-semenya","11":"tag-donald-trump","12":"tag-gender","13":"tag-gender-in-sports","14":"tag-general-news","15":"tag-headlines","16":"tag-imane-khelif","17":"tag-kirsty-coventry","18":"tag-laurel-hubbard","19":"tag-lgbtq","20":"tag-lin-yu-ting","21":"tag-los-angeles","22":"tag-news","23":"tag-olympic-games","24":"tag-sports","25":"tag-top-stories","26":"tag-world-news"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@news\/116296644233581496","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9932","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9932"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9932\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9933"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9932"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9932"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9932"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}