Caster Semenya Gender Test Results -- FanHouse

Semenya's Gender Test Results Are In

Posted Sep 10, 2009 8:09 PM

By CHRIS LEHOURITES

(AP)

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MONACO (Sept. 11) - South African runner Caster Semenya's eligibility to compete as a woman is no clearer — even though reports say she has female and male organs.

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Caster Semenya Photos

South Africa's Caster Semenya celebrates winning the women's 800m final race of the 2009 IAAF Athletics World Championships on August 19, 2009 in Berlin. Gender tests on South African athlete Caster Semenya have found she is a hermaphrodite, an Australian newspaper reported on September 11, 2009, as a senior official admitted she may not be "100 percent" female. Sydney's Daily Telegraph, citing an unnamed source involved in the tests on the world 800m champion, said she had both male and female sex organs and no womb or ovaries. "There certainly is evidence Semenya is a hermaphrodite," the source was quoted as saying. AFP PHOTO / OLIVIER MORIN / FILES (Photo credit should read OLIVIER MORIN/AFP/Getty Images)

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AFP FILES

Caster Semenya

A school girl waits for a donkey cart to pass in the Masehlong village in Moletjie, 65km out of Polokwane , South Africa where Caster Semenya was born, Friday, Sept 11, 2009. Reports on Friday gender testing on South Africa's running sensation has determined she has male and female sexual organs triggered outrage and dealt a blow to her family, who may have been unaware of the reported condition. And, foremost, there is worry about how the 18-year-old will handle all this. (AP Photo/Karel Prinsloo)

Teenage girls from the Nthema Secondary School where Caster Semenya went to school play at a water tap, Friday, Sept. 11, 2009 in Fairlie village around 60 km out of Polokwane, South Africa. Reports on Friday gender testing on South Africa's running sensation has determined she has male and female sexual organs triggered outrage and dealt a blow to her family, who may have been unaware of the reported condition. And, foremost, there is worry about how the 18-year-old will handle all this. (AP Photo/Karel Prinsloo)

International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) general secretary Pierre Weiss speaks during a press conference in Thessaloniki, Greece, Friday, Sept. 11, 2009. At a news conference in Greece on Friday, Weiss, Bubka and other association officials refused to make any comment on the case of South African runner Caster Semenya and distributed the IAAF's written statement to reporters. (AP Photo/Petros Giannakouris)

International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) general secretary Pierre Weiss, left, and IAAF vice president Sergei Bubka, right, answer questions during a press conference in Thessaloniki, Greece, Friday, Sept. 11, 2009. At a news conference in Greece on Friday, Weiss, Bubka and other association officials refused to make any comment on the case of South African runner Caster Semenya and distributed the IAAF's written statement to reporters. (AP Photo/Petros Giannakouris)

International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) vice president Sergei Bubka attends a press conference in Thessaloniki, Greece, Friday, Sept. 11, 2009. At a news conference in Greece on Friday, Weiss, Bubka and other association officials refused to make any comment on the case of South African runner Caster Semenya and distributed the IAAF's written statement to reporters. (AP Photo/Petros Giannakouris)

International Association of Athletics Federations vice president Sergei Bubka, right, speaks during a press conference, as IAAF general secretary Pierre Weiss, left, looks on, in Thessaloniki, Greece, Friday, Sept. 11, 2009. At a news conference in Greece on Friday, Weiss, Bubka and other association officials refused to make any comment on the case of South African runner Caster Semenya and distributed the IAAF's written statement to reporters. (AP Photo/Petros Giannakouris)

FILE -- In this Monday Aug. 17, 2009 file photo South Africa's Caster Semenya pauses after competing in a Women's 800m semifinal at the World Athletics Championships in Berlin. The IAAF said Friday Sept. 11, 2009 it has received the results of gender tests on South African runner Caster Semenya but is still reviewing them and will not issue any final decision until November. (AP Photo/Anja Niedringhaus, File)

(FILES) -- A file photo taken on August 25, 2009 shows South African 18 year-old 800m women's World Champion Caster Semenya smiling as she attends a welcoming ceremony attended by South African president Jacob Zuma (unseen) at the presidential guest house in Pretoria. South African athletics officials and women's 800 metres world champion Caster Semenya's family reacted with anger on September 11, 2009 at an Australian newspaper article that the athlete was a hermaphrodite. Semenya, who had to undergo gender testing following her gold medal showing, will learn her fate in November, the sport's governing body the IAAF said on September 10. AFP PHOTO/PABALLO THEKISO (Photo credit should read PABALLO THEKISO/AFP/Getty Images)

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More: Semenya Drops Out of Race in South Africa

Semenya, who won the women's 800-meter title at last month's world championship in Berlin, has had a gender test, and the results given to track and field's ruling body were leaked to Australian newspapers.

Former IAAF medical commission chairman Arne Ljungqvist would not comment specifically on the Semenya case, but he cautioned that a person's gender is not always easy to define.

"There is no simple, single lab test that can tell if you are a man or a woman. It is not black and white," Ljungqvist told The Associated Press by phone Friday from Sweden. "A person who carries a legal certificate showing that he is a man or a women, then they are a man or a woman."

Semenya comes from a poor village in rural South Africa and first drew attention when she won the 800 title at the African junior championships. With her muscular build and deep voice, more questions were raised at the world championships.

The International Association of Athletics Federations confirmed that Semenya was undergoing a gender test on the day she won the gold medal in the 800 by a huge margin.

Australian newspapers reported that Semenya has no ovaries and has internal testes, which produce testosterone. The IAAF didn't confirm or deny the reports, saying it was reviewing the test results and would announce its findings in November.

"There are many, many other reasons why a woman looks male," Ljungqvist said. "Probably the most common has nothing to do with intersex: production of steroids from the adrenal gland. Most of the women you see who look like men are not intersexed. Some men have a very womanlike body shape."

Another key issue is whether an intersexed person can make use of the natural male hormones they may be producing.

"High levels of testosterone is not a relevant parameter. It's whether they can make use of that testosterone," Ljungqvist said. "Most of them are insensitive to the testosterone because they do not have the receptors to use it."

Anne Fausto-Sterling, a professor of biology and women's studies at Brown University, said making use of testosterone to gain a competitive advantage depends on the level of intersexuality.

"Some give no advantage," Fausto-Sterling said. "You really have to know the specifics, and every individual is different."

International Olympic Committee president Jacques Rogge, speaking a day before the Semenya test results were leaked, said the issue surrounding the South African teenager was a difficult one.

"On one hand there are so many different forms of normality in the human body and the human chemistry," said Rogge, a retired orthopedic surgeon. "You have all kinds of possibilities there. And it is very difficult to have the unanimous advice of various experts. It's not a clear-cut discussion."

Alice Domurat Dreger, a professor of medical humanities and bioethics at Northwestern University in Chicago, said it was not uncommon for someone to be raised as a woman even if they have both sets of sex organs.

"We are raised based on what adults think our sex is at our births," Dreger said on her Web site. "Various conditions can lead to a baby being born with female genitalia (labia, clitoris, vagina) and internal male sex anatomy (including testes)."

For people with Androgen insensitivity syndrome and 5-alpha reductase Deficiency "the baby has testes inside, even though she's clearly a girl," Dreger wrote.

Gender testing in sports is not new, but it has taken on a new twist. In the old days, it was simply to ensure no one was cheating.

"The gender testing as such is intended to make sure that men do not compete as women," said Ljungqvist, who joined the IAAF medical commission in 1981 and left in 2002 before taking over a similar position with the IOC.

At the 2006 Asian Games, 800 champion Santhi Soundarajan of India was stripped of her medal after failing a gender test. Perhaps the most famous case is that of Stella Walsh, also known as Stanislawa Walasiewicz, a Polish runner who won the 100-meter gold medal at the 1932 Olympics and was later found to have ambiguous genitalia.

"Such cases are extremely rare in a grown-up population," Ljungqvist said. "Usually intersexed people are diagnosed at birth."

Until the 2000 Sydney Games, the IOC tested all female competitors to make sure no one was cheating, but Ljungqvist fought to change the way that was done. A panel of experts remains in place to help resolve questions about someone's sexuality.

"Screening was based on the identification of a Y chromosome," Ljungqvist said. "This gender testing by chromosome was completely unscientific and therefore unethical. It took nine more years to get away from it."

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2009-09-10 20:26:03