Canadian Women & Sport Call on WADA to Revise New 2021 World Anti-Doping Code
Canadian Women & Sport calls on the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) to revise the recently approved 2021 World Anti-Doping Code.
Specifically, Article 23.2.2 states that “an International Federation could use data from a Doping Control test to monitor eligibility relating to transgender and other eligibility rules.”
This regulation has the potential to be most harmful to transgender and intersex athletes, who already face increased discrimination and exclusion in sport[1]. They also increase the likelihood that sport federations may unfairly target or question women athletes who do not appear “woman enough”[2] based on gender stereotypes. Canadian Women & Sport is opposed to gender-verification testing for women in sport for this reason, and because we feel it imposes limits on women’s physical characteristics that do not reflect the true diversity of women’s body types.
Canadian Women & Sport believes that the World Anti-Doping Code and doping control testing should not be used to facilitate gender policing, which is a violation of an athlete’s right to non-discriminatory treatment.
Canadian Women & Sport supports the Canadian Centre for Ethics in Sport’s (CCES) decision to present a 2021 Canadian Anti-Doping Program which states that the CCES will not use data from a doping control test for any other purpose than for doping control.
Canadian Women & Sport calls on WADA and all World Anti-Doping Code Signatories to follow CCES’ lead and not use data from doping control tests in their own jurisdictions to support gender eligibility policies.
Read more about the 2021 Canadian Anti-Doping Program.
Read more about the revision to the World Anti-Doping Code.
Read an article from Human Rights Watch about why abusive sex testing for women athletes must be stopped.
[1] Play to Win: Improving the Lives of LGBTQ Youth in Sports, Human Rights Campaign
[2] ‘The question of gender in sport: Are you woman enough?’ By Anna Kessel