The big problem I have is with the future female athletes – in all sports.
There has always been acknowledgement that Testosterone is a drug that aids performance. Males produce a lot of it naturally, females less. Hence there has always been a limit (set a degree or two above natural production) above which drug taking has been taken as fact.
If we are to allow those taking part in female sport (of any and all types) to be allowed an almost limitless amount of Testosterone in their system, and this for years, how long before unscrupulous coaches, parents, national sports associations and even governments start injecting young girls to produce the gold medal winners of tomorrow.
This is not scaremongering, it has been done before. The entire Soviet Bloc was at it before the walls came down, and numerous athletes had their health (and indeed life) ruined by those who pumped them full of whatever their scientists reckoned would help.
Caster Semenya almost certainly * had nothing to do with illegal drug taking (apart from anything else I sincerely doubt she would have had the money to obtain such), but there are those that do have the wherewithal, and who would indeed carry out such a drug regimen. You only have to look at the fact that Russia is STILL banned for its government-sponsored drug regime, where many athletes were under the impression that they were being given vitamins or such like.
It may well be that (sadly) one person (Semenya) suffers, but what about the rest of sport today, and more importantly, what about the safety of ALL the female athletes in ALL sports tomorrow.
* – I say “almost certainly” because I have no access to the records that could/would prove it, not for any other reason.
