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.
