The women’s Olympic boxing championships are set to conclude this weekend. Two of the contests have attracted a disproportionate amount of attention in the preceding weeks: the women’s welterweight and featherweight divisions. Imane Khelif of the welterweight class, and Lin Yu-ting of the featherweight class, have found themselves at the centre of a maelstrom of political controversy over the legitimacy of their participation in the competition.

At the start of the competition, extensive social media debate centred on the misconception that Khelif was a transgender woman, which has since been debunked. The controversy has not abated, however, and in the aftermath of the success of both athletes at quarter and semi-final bouts, questions have been raised about the potential of both Khelif and Yu-ting to possess an innate sex based advantage over their opponents.

The root of the issue can be traced back to the 2023 World Boxing Championship, in which the International Boxing Association (IBA) disqualified both athletes from competing, after they were deemed “ineligible” for competition on the back of a chromosome test.

The nature of the testing and methodologies used remain unclear, and the International Olympic Commission (IOC) has criticised the approach of the IBA to gender testing. This comes a year after the IOC cut ties with the IBA, citing ethical and financial impropriety and misconduct. The IOC have defended the inclusion of both Khelif and Yu-ting in the competition despite their previous disqualification from the 2023 World Championships. The IOC eligibility criteria seems to be based on passport identification; rendering both Khelif and Yu-ting as eligible given their status of female at birth.

Lin Yu-tingLin Yu-ting (Image: free)

It has been suggested, on the back of their previous disqualification, that both Khelif and Yu-ting are likely to have differences of sex development (DSD), a term which refers to a group of rare conditions affecting sex chromosomes, hormone levels, and reproductive organs.

The process of sex determination generally relates to the presence of XX versus XY chromosomes, in which individuals in possession of ‘Y’ chromosomes develop male reproductive organs and produce male hormones.

DSD refers to the incidence of sex development that does not conform to the usual chromosomal model because of a variety of genetic variations. It has been suggested, therefore, that simply being in possession of ‘XY’ chromosomes cannot definitively indicate the sex of an individual.

Experts have referred to the SRY gene - the ‘sex determining region of the Y chromosome’ as being a more specific indicator of someone’s sex in instances of DSD, which would prompt the production of high levels of testosterone and male reproductive organs, which may develop inside of the body.

Caster Semenya, two-time Olympic champion, and three-time World champion across 800m, last October released her autobiography ‘The Race To Be Myself’. The autobiography charts the athlete’s experience with the discovery of her condition 46 XY 5-ARD (5-alpha-reductase deficiency), a form of DSD, on the world stage, after she was made to undergo gender testing by the World Athletics governing body in 2009.

In 2018, World Athletics proposed new restrictions that imposed a threshold on testosterone levels that female athletes could have and still be considered eligible for competition. Semenya’s condition means that she has XY chromosomes, but was born with female genitalia and was identified as female at birth.

Semenya appealed the proposed restrictions in 2019 at the Court of Arbitration for Sport (Cas). The appeal was lost, and has constituted a landmark precedent in the sport. As things stand, Semenya and others with her DSD condition and similar ones remain unable to compete in female track events without taking testosterone reducing drugs.

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In 2023, the scope of the restrictions were increased from athletes competing in distances from 400m to a mile, to all female athletes competing in track events. The World Athletics body have dictated that affected athletes will be required to reduce their blood testosterone levels to below 2.5 nanomoles per litre, and have maintained this level for two years before being able to compete in international competitions.

Whether or not the framework that has been established in athletics is the right one, in the absence of any similar criteria for international boxing, chaos has reigned over women's contests at the Olympics. Being a contact sport, boxing has invoked a particularly emotive response to the issue, as Khelif’s Italian opponent Angela Carini pulled out just 46 seconds after the bout began, stating it was the “hardest” she had ever been hit. Carini has since apologised to Khelif.

We find ourselves in the midst of a zero-sum debate that has seen Khelif wrongfully labelled as transgender, and both athletes subject to scrutiny of a deeply personal nature. There hasn’t been any official confirmation that either athlete actually has DSD, after Chris Roberts, Secretary General of the IBA, told reporters to “read between the lines” in reference to the results of the pair’s 2023 chromosome test at a press conference.

One thing is clear: not enough is understood about DSD in female athletes. Experts are clear that the rare and multi-faceted conditions can produce a range of biological outcomes in those that experience them. Accordingly, the implications for levels of testosterone and different biological markers of sporting aptitude are varied. Until a standardised international policy on DSD athletes is established, alongside some clarity on its relation to different sports, the controversy is going nowhere.