In one of the most consequential policy reversals in modern Olympic history, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) has shifted from an inclusion-first transgender participation framework to a centralized, restrictive model designed to protect the integrity of the female category.
The change, formalized in mid-2025 under the leadership of newly elected IOC President Kirsty Coventry, marks a decisive break from the organization’s 2021 Framework on Fairness, Inclusion and Non-Discrimination a document that had emphasized flexibility, athlete autonomy, and sport-specific regulation.
The new direction is clear: elite women’s sport must be governed primarily by competitive fairness, biological reality, and scientific evidence about performance advantage. Inclusion remains an Olympic value, but no longer the determining principle in decisions on eligibility.
From Decentralization to Central Control
The 2021 Framework had delegated responsibility to individual International Federations (IFs), instructing them to design their own eligibility rules using ten guiding principles among them inclusion, non-discrimination, and no presumption of advantage. It did not impose mandatory hormone thresholds or biological criteria. Instead, it trusted each sport to weigh fairness and inclusion based on evidence.
However, by 2025, the IOC reversed course. Mounting scientific data, intensifying political pressures, and a sharp rise in restrictive IF-level rules prompted the organization to centralize transgender eligibility for the Olympic Games. Instead of autonomy, the IOC will now impose uniform categories and exclusion thresholds, likely before the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics.
This U-turn reflects the conclusion that relying on IFs alone produced inconsistent, controversial, and in some cases legally vulnerable policies and that elite fairness in the female category required a universal standard.
The Coventry Factor: Leadership and Mandate
Kirsty Coventry’s election as IOC President fast-tracked this ideological shift. A two-time Olympic champion and former Zimbabwean Sports Minister, Coventry campaigned on one clear promise: protect the female category by basing eligibility strictly on biological sex.
She publicly supported a full ban on transgender women competing in women’s events, arguing that the physical advantages of male puberty undermine meaningful fairness. Coventry pointed to contentious cases from Paris 2024 notably boxers Lin Yuting and Imane Khelif as catalysts for reflection, despite the fact that Khelif is a DSD athlete rather than transgender. The political symbolism of these controversies nonetheless strengthened her argument that women’s categories were under systemic strain.
Within months of her election, the IOC announced its policy reset.
A New Working Group and a Confidential Process
In September 2025, the IOC created the Protection of the Female Category Working Group, tasked with formulating centralized criteria for transgender eligibility. Notably, the IOC chose to keep the group’s membership confidential a decision rooted in the politically charged environment surrounding the issue. Protecting experts from lobbying, media pressure, and activism became a stated priority.
In late 2025, IOC Director of Health, Medicine and Science Dr. Jane Thornton presented scientific findings to IOC members. She confirmed that male puberty leaves permanent physical advantages, and that these advantages are only minimally reduced by hormone therapy reinforcing the need for stronger eligibility limits.
The Scientific Basis: Retained Advantage After Transition
At the core of the IOC’s shift is a simple scientific conclusion: gender-affirming hormone therapy does not eliminate the physiological legacy of male puberty. Research presented to the IOC underscores the following:
- Transgender women lose only ~5% of muscle mass/area after 12 months of testosterone suppression.
- Strength advantage especially upper-body persists even after 4 years of treatment.
- Endurance advantages, including running speed, remain ~9% higher after one year of suppression a massive gap given that elite races are often decided by <1%.
These data undermine prior inclusion models that relied on testosterone levels as the key criterion. The IOC’s pivot frames the matter not as identity suppression but as ensuring that women’s sport is contested by athletes without retained male advantages.
Alignment With International Federations
The IOC’s direction mirrors restrictive policies already enacted by major IFs:
- World Athletics (WA): bans transgender women who experienced any male puberty beyond age 12; requires SRY gene testing.
- World Aquatics (AQUA): similar puberty-based exclusion.
- World Rugby: bans transgender women from elite women’s rugby on safety grounds.
These IFs effectively established a functional global standard before the IOC stepped in. The IOC’s 2025 move now codifies this trend into Olympic-wide policy. But the use of the SRY gene as a proxy for sex has generated scientific pushback. Experts warn that biological sex cannot be reduced to one gene, and that mandatory genetic testing risks entangling transgender eligibility with rules affecting DSD athletes, whose conditions differ fundamentally.
Geopolitical Pressures: The LA 2028 Factor
The impending Los Angeles Games have accelerated the IOC’s policy consolidation. In February 2025, U.S. President Donald Trump issued Executive Order 14201, “Keeping Men Out of Women’s Sports,” mandating federal restrictions against the participation of transgender women in women’s categories. Following this, the USOPC and NCAA updated their own policies, restricting female categories to athletes “assigned female at birth.” To avoid regulatory conflict with its host nation and ensure smooth delivery of the Games, the IOC has aligned its trajectory with U.S. federal policy.
Legal battles are ongoing even reaching the U.S. Supreme Court while the Semenya ruling at the European Court of Human Rights warns against policies that mandate medical intervention. But the IOC appears intent on framing eligibility around puberty history, not medical therapy, to avoid these legal pitfalls.
Toward a New Category System
Human rights voices, including the UN Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women and Girls, have supported restrictions while urging the creation of Open Categories. The IOC is likely to lean on this model: a protected women’s category based on biological sex, paired with open participation pathways.
Read Articles Without Ads On Your IndiaSportsHub App. Download Now And Stay Updated
The IOC’s 2025 transgender eligibility shift is a true transformation scientific, political, and structural. Driven by data, pressured by geopolitics, and steered by firm leadership, the Olympic movement is preparing to implement a puberty-based exclusion standard that will redefine the female category ahead of LA 2028.
The challenge now remains balancing fairness with inclusion without compromising the integrity of women’s sport.
