World Athletics to introduce genetic tests for women

NANJING — World Athletics president Sebastian Coe said Tuesday that the track and field's governing body has approved the introduction of cheek swabs and dry blood-spot tests for female athletes in order to maintain "the integrity of competition".

The planned changes include reinstating a version of chromosome testing that was discontinued in the 1990s, requiring athletes who compete in the female category to submit to a cheek swab or dry blood-spot test for the presence of a gene that indicates whether the athlete has the "Y" chromosome present in males.

Coe told a news conference that athletes will have to take the test just once during their career.

"It's important to do it, because it maintains everything that we've been talking about, and particularly recently, about not just talking about the integrity of female women's sport, but actually guaranteeing it," Coe said after a two-day meeting of the World Athletics Council in Nanjing. "We feel this is a really important way of providing confidence and maintaining that absolute focus on the integrity of competition."

It's unclear whether the tests will be in place before the world championships in September. Coe said that the new regulations will be drafted, and that a testing provider will be confirmed over the next few weeks.

Coe, the two-time Olympic champion who was unsuccessful last week in his bid to become IOC president, has been vocal about "protecting the female category" in track and field. He has said the International Olympic Committee needs to take a leadership role in the transgender debate, instead of letting each individual sport decide their own regulations.

World Athletics, which in 2023 banned transgender athletes who had transitioned from male to female and gone through male puberty, announced in February proposed recommendations that would apply strict transgender rules to athletes who were born female, but had what the organization describes as naturally occurring testosterone levels in the typical male range.

Those recommendations came only days after US President Donald Trump signed an executive order barring transgender athletes from competing in girls sports in the US and pressured the Olympics to do the same. Los Angeles will host the 2028 Summer Games.

Legal challenges

Asked whether World Athletics felt the policy would withstand legal challenges, Coe said he was confident after an exhaustive review.

"I would never have set off down this path in 2016-2017 to protect the female category in sport without being prepared to take the challenge head on," Coe said.

He added: "We've been to the Court of Arbitration on our DSD(differences in sex development) regulations. They have been upheld, and they have again been upheld after appeal. So we will doggedly protect the female category, and we'll do whatever is necessary to do so."

Coe warned during his campaign to be elected IOC president "that we run the risk of losing women's sport" unless the female category was protected.

The Briton finished third in the race last week, which was won by Kirsty Coventry, the former Olympic swimmer from Zimbabwe.

Agencies