New policy expected early next year under IOC would end current guidelines allowing transgender athletes to compete with lowered testosterone levels to ‘protect female category’

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) is preparing to ban transgender women from competing in female categories across all Olympic sports following a “scientific review” on physical advantages linked to male puberty, The Times reported Monday.

According to the British daily, the new policy, expected to be announced early next year under IOC President Kirsty Coventry, follows findings that the physical benefits of being born male “remain even after testosterone suppression.”

The review was presented last week in Lausanne, Switzerland, by Dr. Jane Thornton, a Canadian sports medicine physician, the IOC’s medical and scientific director and a former Olympic rower.

“It was a very scientific, factual, and unemotional presentation which quite clearly laid out the evidence,” one source familiar with the meeting told The Times, adding that feedback from IOC members was “hugely positive.”

The upcoming rules would replace the IOC’s previous guidance, allowing transgender athletes to compete with reduced testosterone levels, a framework that left eligibility decisions to individual sports.

Coventry, a former Olympic swimmer from Zimbabwe who took office this year, has said the committee’s approach aims to “place emphasis on the protection of the female category” while maintaining a “scientific approach” in coordination with international federations.

The policy is also expected to address athletes with differences of sexual development (DSD) following debates surrounding competitors such as Algeria’s Imane Khelif and Taiwan’s Lin Yu-Ting, who won gold medals at the Paris 2024 Olympics despite prior eligibility disputes.

An announcement could come as early as February, during an IOC session before the Milan-Cortina Winter Games, pending final legal review of the new rules.