Milan, Sept 9 (LaPresse) – Almost all female athletes have completed the genetic test to determine sex ahead of this month’s World Athletics Championships in Japan. World Athletics announced that over 95% of the tests—a genetic screening to determine the athlete’s sex at birth—have been completed ahead of the World Championships, which will be held in Tokyo starting this weekend. The athletics governing body stated that the remaining tests—for the French and Norwegian teams, and some athletes residing in France, both countries where genetic tests for non-medical reasons are prohibited—will be carried out in Tokyo before the competition begins. “This has been the whole sport’s response to a principle we all deeply believe in: protecting the female category,” said World Athletics President Sebastian Coe. World Athletics was the first international Olympic federation to reintroduce chromosomal testing—previously discontinued in the 1990s—requiring athletes competing in female events to undergo testing once in their career. In March, it announced the approval of swab and dried blood spot tests for female athletes to preserve “the integrity of the competition.”
Milan, Sept 9 (LaPresse) – Almost all female athletes have completed the genetic test to determine sex ahead of this month’s World Athletics Championships in Japan. World Athletics announced that over 95% of the tests—a genetic screening to determine the athlete’s sex at birth—have been completed ahead of the World Championships, which will be held in Tokyo starting this weekend. The athletics governing body stated that the remaining tests—for the French and Norwegian teams, and some athletes residing in France, both countries where genetic tests for non-medical reasons are prohibited—will be carried out in Tokyo before the competition begins.
“This has been the whole sport’s response to a principle we all deeply believe in: protecting the female category,” said World Athletics President Sebastian Coe. World Athletics was the first international Olympic federation to reintroduce chromosomal testing—previously discontinued in the 1990s—requiring athletes competing in female events to undergo testing once in their career. In March, it announced the approval of swab and dried blood spot tests for female athletes to preserve “the integrity of the competition.”
