Overview
- The IOC introduced a once-in-a-lifetime SRY gene screen for eligibility in the women’s category, starting with the Los Angeles 2028 Games, using a saliva, cheek swab or blood test that renders anyone who tests positive ineligible.
- The committee frames the move as necessary for fairness and safety, while athletes such as Caster Semenya and Dutee Chand call it discriminatory and warn it can out athletes and end careers.
- A UN special rapporteur, Reem Alsalem, praised the policy as common sense and said it protects women’s rights, highlighting a sharp split in global reaction.
- Legal and human-rights experts say compulsory genetic screening risks violating privacy and biomedicine laws and predict challenges at the Court of Arbitration for Sport.
- Scientists dispute that a single SRY marker proves athletic advantage for many people with differences of sexual development and note the IOC is reviving gene checks dropped in the 1990s over accuracy and ethics concerns.