For long criticised for taking a back seat over what many describe a serious matter and fueled by the gender furore that engulfed boxing at the 2024 Paris Olympics, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) is considering reintroducing testing, while several sports have already embraced testing for male chromosomes.

It's nothing new by the way, as such testing has its fierce critics and the Olympics has already tried it before, only to abandon it in 1996 following protests over invasive tests.

New IOC president Kirsty Coventry, who takes over Monday, described the possibility of a change of direction on a politically inflammatory and scientifically complex issue when she was elected back in March.

"We will protect the female category and female athletes," said Coventry, a Zimbabwean swimmer who won seven Olympic medals.

At recent Games, the IOC has left responsibility for setting and enforcing gender rules to the international federations that run their sports.

"I want the IOC to take a little bit more of a leading role," Coventry said, adding that she planned to create "a task force."

Even before Coventry begins her consultations, World Athletics and World Boxing have adopted chromosomal testing – generally a cheek swab. World Aquatics in 2023 adopted a policy that foresees such testing.

Their rules make participation in women's competition conditional on the absence of Y chromosome genetic material, known as the SRY gene, an indicator of masculinity.

Only "XX athletes", as World Athletics calls them, can compete. Both transgender women and those who have always been considered female but have XY chromosomes, a form of "differences in sex development" (DSD), are excluded.

The gender debate reignited in June around Paris Olympic boxing champion Imane Khelif.

The Algerian was at the centre of controversy over her gender last summer, stoked by Donald Trump, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, and Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling who called her Male.

World Boxing, which is taking over running Olympic boxing in Los Angeles in 2028, ordered Khelif to undergo testing before a competition in the Netherlands in early June. She skipped the event.