World Athletics bans transgender women from women’s competition

World Athletics has banned trans women from international competition, Sebastian Coe has confirmed.

The governing body has opted to exclude male-to-female transgender athletes and those with differences in sex development (DSD) from female competition if they have gone through male puberty.

The decision comes after World Athletics consulted with member federations in January about a change to rules, insisting they would “follow the science... in order to protect the female category, maintain fairness in our competitions, and remain as inclusive as possible."

And now Lord Coe, president of World Athletics, has confirmed a change to its rules starting on 31 March.

A statemen read: "The Council has agreed to exclude male to female transgender athletes who have been through male puberty from female world ranking competitions from 31 March this year.

"We cannot in all conscience leave our transgender regulations as they were at 5n/mol for at least one year when we were unsure about the impact of doing so across all our disciplines.

"The decision that the council made is a primarily principled based decision about the over-arching need to protect the female category. This is what our sport is here to do. And I think the council has done that today."

Transgender rights have become a major talking point as sports seek to balance inclusivity with ensuring there is no unfair advantage.

With athletes such as Commonwealth Games champion Eilish McColgan contributing to the debate and claiming a one percent advantage for trans women athletes would be “too much”.

LGBTQI advocacy groups say excluding trans athletes amounts to discrimination and World Athletics’ move follows World Aquatics and its vote last year to restrict participation of transgender athletes in elite women’s competitions.

Lord Coe had praised the move, which saw the sport create a working group to establish an "open" category.

The move comes after the World Athletics Council confirmed a number of landmark decisions on future participation.

The governing body also confirmed the reinstatement of the Russian Federation (RusAF) following seven years of suspension after institutional doping violations.

But athletes, officials and supporting personnel from Russia and Belarus remain excluded from competition for the foreseeable future due to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.