IOC rules transgender athletes can take part in Olympics without surgery
Female-to-male athletes can compete ‘without restriction’, while male-to-female athletes must undergo hormone therapy, according to new guidelines
Transgender athletes should be allowed to compete in the Olympics and other international events without undergoing sex reassignment surgery, according to new guidelines adopted by the IOC.
International Olympic Committee medical officials said on Sunday they changed the policy to adapt to current scientific, social and legal attitudes on transgender issues.
The guidelines are designed as recommendations – not rules or regulations – for international sports federations and other bodies to follow and should apply for this year’s
Olympics in Rio de Janeiro.
“I don’t think many federations have rules on defining eligibility of transgender individuals,” IOC medical director Dr Richard Budgett said. “This should give them the confidence and stimulus to put these rules in place.”
Under the previous IOC guidelines, approved in 2003, athletes who transitioned from male to female or vice versa were required to have reassignment surgery followed by at least two years of hormone therapy in order to be eligible to compete.
Now, surgery will no longer be required, with female-to-male transgender athletes eligible to take part in men’s competitions “without restriction”.
Meanwhile, male-to-female transgender athletes will need to demonstrate that their testosterone level has been below a certain cutoff point for at least one year before their first competition.
“It is necessary to ensure insofar as possible that trans athletes are not excluded from the opportunity to participate in sporting competition,” the IOC said in a
document (pdf) posted on its website that outlines the guidelines. “The overriding sporting objective is and remains the guarantee of fair competition.
“To require surgical anatomical changes as a precondition to participation is not necessary to preserve fair competition and may be inconsistent with developing legislation and notions of human rights,” it added.
The guidelines, first reported by
Outsports.com, were approved after a meeting in November 2015 in Lausanne, Switzerland, of Olympic officials and medical experts.
Budgett said there were no plans for the guidelines to be sent for approval by the IOC executive board.
“This is a scientific consensus paper, not a rule or regulation,” he said. “It is the advice of the medical and scientific commission and what we consider the best advice.”
Former IOC medical commission chairman Arne Ljungqvist, who was among the experts involved in drafting the new guidelines, said the consensus was driven by social and political changes.
“It has become much more of a social issue than in the past,” he told Associated Press. “We had to review and look into this from a new angle. We needed to adapt to the modern legislation around the world. We felt we cannot impose a surgery if that is no longer a legal requirement.
https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2...tes-can-take-part-in-olympics-without-surgery
