Transgender girls who want to play high school sports in Utah will now have to meet a set of health standards more stringent than those for professional athletes competing in the Olympics or the NCAA.
That includes maintaining a testosterone level that is more than four times lower than the threshold for college sports. And to be approved to play, students must be receiving medical care for gender transition — even though that care was banned in Utah in 2023, making it impossible to begin seeing a doctor for it if a student wasn’t already doing so before that law was passed.
Advocates are concerned the standards — the first explicit guidelines ever released by the state — were drafted purposefully to keep any transgender girls from actually being able to qualify to play here.
A public notice for the meeting was posted just before 10 p.m. on Thursday, Jan. 2. The fully online meeting was then held on Monday, Jan. 6 at 4:30 p.m. That does not break Utah law, which requires just 24 hours notice.
During the meeting, Utah’s School Activity Eligibility Commission — tasked by the state with hearing cases and deciding which transgender girls can or can’t participate in high school athletics — passed the new standards with little discussion, few edits and a unanimous vote.
