Intersex Asia Calls for Ending Discrimination Against Female Athletes with Intersex Traits

Last week, the Swiss Federal Supreme Court dismissed the appeal filed by Champion athlete Caster Semenya against the IAAF’s regulations for female athletes with intersex traits. The judgment has affirmed IAAF’s regulations which violates the consent rights and bodily integrity of female athletes with intersex traits by subjecting them to discriminatory sex verification tests and compelling them to alter their body through involuntary drug interventions. Even the Swiss Court has recognised that IAAF’s regulations violate the physical integrity of female athletes. 

Intersex Asia expresses serious concerns over IAAF’s reasoning that discrimination against female athletes with intersex traits is “necessary” to ensure fairness. IAAF’s regulations are based on an erroneous premise that female athletes with relatively higher testosterone levels have a performance advantage. The medical community has also questioned this premise. Like Caster Semenya, several ace Asian female athletes including Santhi Soundarajan and Dutee Chand have suffered on account of IAAF’s rules which subjected to sex verification tests. 

The practice of conducting such tests and forced drug interventions has been called into question by leading experts around the world for being violative of international human rights standards. In 2019, the UN Human Rights Council affirmed this view when it adopted a historic resolution calling upon states to “ensure that sporting associations and bodies implement policies and practices in accordance with international human rights norms and standards”. 

IAAF regulations pose a cruel dilemma before female athletes with intersex traits. Either they are compelled to undergo drug interventions to alter their body or not participate in the sporting events which are governed by the regulations. 

The sex verification tests conducted by IAAF violate international human rights law in general and the principle of ‘substantive equality’ under the Convention on Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW). Gender tests using testosterone levels as a measure clearly violate CEDAW. The fact that the measurement of testosterone levels is conducted only in women violates Article 15 (1) of CEDAW as the rule is not applicable to men. Article 5(a) is also violated as gender testing is based on the idea of the inferiority and superiority of either of the sexes.   

We call upon the World Medical Association, World Health Organisation, and the United Nations to intervene and advocate for regulations that affirm the dignity and bodily integrity of female athletes with intersex traits. 

We join the global intersex community and sporting community in calling for the revocation of discriminatory policies of World Athletics and ending the current discrimination against female athletes with intersex traits.