She was subsequently put on medication to reduce her testosterone levels, spending six months sidelined by the IAAF. Sociologist Beatrice Barbusse, a specialist in sexism in sport, added: "Sport has been built on this dichotomy between men and women on a binary concept of sexes.
World sport's highest court, the Court of Arbitration for Sport CAS , found that the new regulations "were a necessary, reasonable and proportionate means of achieving the IAAF's legitimate objective of fair and meaningful competition in female athletics".
By comparing the results of female athletes with the highest concentrations of testosterone with those with the lowest level, the study concluded that the women with a high level of the hormone had a significant advantage in track events ranging from the m to the m, as well as the pole vault and hammer throw.
The results were strongly contested in some quarters. The results were strongly contested in some quarters. To reduce overly high levels of testosterone, the IAAF suggest the female athletes concerned either take a daily oral contraceptive, hormone-reducing drugs or, more radically, a gonadectomy -- an operation in which testes are removed. But is it possible to force people who are not ill to take medication which could cause secondary effects?
Share Via. Paris By Press Trust of India. While these claims were never proved, they did have significant repercussions, felt by female athletes even today. Earlier this month, according to reports, Semenya lost a crucial case after the Court of Arbitration for Sport ruled that female track athletes with naturally high levels of testosterone can only participate in major events, including the Olympics, if they decrease their hormone levels.
Semenya had challenged those restrictions placed on women, but ultimately suffered defeat. Sex testing, a process that was introduced in the s by sports authorities, sought to prevent male athletes posing as female in international competition. While athletes could initially present an affidavit from their own doctors to show proof of their gender, this soon moved to gynaecological examinations and visual inspections.
This approach was adopted in the s when genetic testing and chromosomal analysis became a standard for sex testing. The International Association of Athletics Federation IAAF , the global body which oversees track and field events, first mandated sex testing in for female athletes competing in the European Championships held in Belgium. In , testing was introduced in the Olympics.
The reasoning for the necessity of such a test was because of the a suspicion that some of the best women athletes were actually men. That gives them some male biological characteristics, male levels of the hormone testosterone after puberty, and an unfair athletic advantage over other female athletes, the IAAF says.
Semenya, who has been fighting the IAAF ever since she was embroiled in a gender verification test at the world championships 10 years ago, says the rules should be discarded and she should be allowed to run in her natural form. She disputes that she has a significant performance advantage. She won an interim ruling to temporarily suspend the hormone regulations and the Swiss supreme court will hear her full appeal. To be allowed to compete under the rules, Semenya and other affected athletes must medically reduce their testosterone to below a specific threshold set by the IAAF.
The IAAF gives three options to do that: A daily contraceptive pill, a monthly hormone-blocking injection, or surgery.
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