Sport is right to man up on issue of testosterone levels

Life is full of complexities. Birth sex isn’t one of them. You are born male or female and die male or ­female. For 99 per cent of ­humanity, the truth is self-evident. It is also politically incorrect.

Activists demand legal recognition that someone born male is female if they say so. The foundational delusion of transsexuality has spread from consciousness-raising sessions and student rooms to international sport.

Several athletes born male, or with intersex conditions that elevate testosterone levels, want to compete against women. Martina Navratilova believes it is cheating for men to participate in women’s sport, but she toys with the myth of transgender ideology that birth sex can be changed. However, medical interventions to change sex only produce a simulation of female or male biology.

The argument about men competing in women’s sport should be relatively straightforward; if you were born male, fight fair by competing against other men. The case of people born with intersex conditions is more complex. They comprise less than 1 per cent of the population and have a range of hormonal variations, some of which result in external female genitalia with internal testes that produce testosterone.

Major sporting bodies have introduced guidelines to address the advantages that elevated testosterone levels can give intersex people who compete in women’s sport. In 2015, the International Olympic Committee released guidelines covering transgender participation in women’s sport. It recognised that transgender people could compete in women’s events if they had testosterone levels under 10 nanomoles per litre a year before competing and during competition.

Otago University professor Alison Heather has researched the impact of testosterone on performance-related physiology in sport. Heather is concerned that the levels set by sporting bodies do not account for physical advantages men can retain after undergoing hormone therapy to reduce testosterone levels. Her research indicates male-to-female transgender athletes could still benefit from physiological attributes such as body size, muscle mass, lung capacity, and heart size.

The International Association of Athletic Federations has created “eligibility standards that ensure that athletes who identify as female but have testes, and testosterone levels in the male range, at least drop their testosterone levels into the female range in order to compete at the elite level in the female classification”.

In response to the guidelines, athlete Caster Semenya launched legal action against the IAAF. Semenya reportedly has internal testes and testosterone levels three times that of women. She cruised home to win double gold in the women’s 800m and 1500m at the Commonwealth Games last year. Australian 800m runner Brittany McGowan said it was unfair to compare her performance and that of other athletes to Semenya’s. Medical research appears to support McGowan’s complaint.

In 2017, research by Stephane Bermon and Pierre-Yves Garnier showed that female athletes with the highest free testosterone concentrations perform better in the 400m, 400m hurdles, 800m hammer throw and pole vault. The authors concluded that female athletes with high free testosterone have a notable advantage.

Another study published in 2017 demonstrated that “higher levels of precursor androgens” in female athletes was correlated with better performance. Researcher Emma Ekland and her colleagues concluded their results “support a significant role of endogenous androgens for athletic performance in women, which is highly relevant for the ongoing dialogue regarding women athletes and hyperandrogenism”.

What is significant in the debate about intersex and transgender people in women’s sport is the amount of research required to prove the obvious.

Men perform better in sports requiring strength and speed because of their biology. Intersex people with high testosterone levels during developmental years can have a competitive sporting advantage against women.

Some argue that testosterone confers no physical benefits in sport. As such, men who identify as transgender should be allowed to compete in women’s events. If testosterone matters little to performance, why aren’t high-oestrogen athletes winning gold in men’s track and field or weightlifting? It does seem the transgender and intersex winning streak in international sports comes with a hefty dose of testosterone alongside claims of womanhood.

For Navratilova, the Semenya case provides an exception to the rule because she was born with a condition called hyperandrogenism. As such, the high testosterone levels in her body are naturally occurring. But so too are testosterone levels in men. If someone is born intersex but has testosterone levels approaching the male range, many believe they should compete in men’s events.

The IAAF rules that athletes with testosterone levels well above the normal amount for females should lower the levels to compete in women’s sport.

Like Navratilova, I don’t agree an athlete should be compelled to take potentially harmful substances to compete in sport. However, if intersex athletes have a performance-related hormone profile more similar to men than women, perhaps they should compete against men. Some have proposed separate events to celebrate the sporting achievements of intersex athletes, but the risk of public ridicule is significant.

It is not clear that the Semenya case is a matter of discrimination, as Navratilova seems to suggest.

It is a question of science and a matter of fair play. IAAF president Sebastian Coe made the case during legal proceedings last week: “The core value for the IAAF is the empowerment of girls and women through athletics … The regulations that we are introducing are there to protect the sanctity of fair and open competition.”

People who are born intersex or identify as transgender are entitled to the same rights and human dignity as everyone else. However, they are not entitled to demand privileges that give them an unfair advantage when competing against women and girls in sport, or any other area. Fairness is a universal value that loses all meaning when it is enjoyed by one group at the expense of another.