IOC’s transgender guidelines delayed again over “very conflicting opinions”

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) has once again delayed its new transgender guidelines for sport.

It is now expected that they will be published after next year’s Beijing Winter Olympics in February, meaning they would arrive three years after they were first planned to as a result of “very conflicting opinions”.

Dr Richard Budgett, the IOC’s science and medical director, shared the updated timeline for the guidance, explaining that it will “prioritise inclusion” and “avoidance of harm”.

Under current guidance, the IOC says that trans women can compete in the women’s category if their testosterone is lowered for an entire year.

Individual sports federations can also create their own rules, though the IOC’s guidance is expected to shift when the new guidelines are released.

Budgett confirmed this when speaking to a Council of Europe conference about the inclusion of trans athletes in sport.

“There’ll be broad high-level guidelines – more like a framework,” he shared. “It’s the international federations who will determine the specific rules for their sports and their events.

“The particular changes from 2015 are the emphasis on the priority of inclusion, and on the avoidance of harm, but always bearing in mind the importance of fair and meaningful competition. We still have to agree on the framework. It’s challenging. But it will be published in a few months’ time – at the latest just after the Beijing Olympic Winter Games.

“We’re very aware that sex, of course, is not binary. It’s a continuum. The sectors overlap. And so the solutions are not essentially going to be binary.”

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