IOC announces ban of transgender women athletes

Field Level Media|published: Thu 26th March, 11:28 2026

May 10, 2017; Los Angeles, CA, USA; The International Olympic Committee and Olympic rings logo at the LA2024 press conference at the J.W. Marriott Los Angeles L.A. LIVE. Mandatory Credit: Kirby Lee-Imagn Images

The International Olympic Committee has banned transgender women from competing at the Olympics, starting with the 2028 Summer Games in Los Angeles.

"Eligibility 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," the IOC said Thursday, with such status to be determined by a mandatory gene test administered once in an athlete's career.

The decision announced by IOC president Kirsty Coventry reverses more than two decades of policies that had favored inclusion.

"At the Olympic Games, even the smallest margins can be the difference between victory and defeat," Coventry, a two-time Olympic gold medalist in swimming, said in a statement. "So, it is absolutely clear that it would not be fair for biological males to compete in the female category."

Only one openly transgender woman has competed in the Olympics since the IOC began allowing the participation in 2004, according to USA Today. A New Zealand weightlifter did not make it past the first round of competition at the Tokyo Games in 2021.

The IOC's 10-page policy document also restricts women athletes with the medical condition DSD, or differences in sex development, such as two-time Olympic 800-meter champion Caster Semenya of South Africa.

The document includes findings of the IOC's research into the supposed physical advantages that come with being born male.

"Males experience three significant testosterone peaks: In utero, in mini-puberty of infancy and beginning in adolescent puberty through adulthood," the document said, adding that this gives males "individual sex-based performance advantages in sports and events that rely on strength, power and/or endurance."

The new IOC policy aligns with U.S. President Donald Trump's February 2025 executive order "Keeping Men Out of Women's Sports," which threatened to halt funding for organizations that allow transgender athletes to participate in women's sports.

--Field Level Media

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