QueerDefenseFront

“The National Gender Service (NGS), which provides healthcare for transgender adults, is closing its waiting lists due to a lack of resources, Prime Time has learned.”

“There are around 2,470 people currently on the waiting list, which the NGS plans to close to new clients on 1 March 2026. Those who are on the list will be assessed, though at current rates that process could take many years.

“As of last month, the average waiting time for assessment was four and a half years. In December 2019 it was 14 months. While the NGS is an adult service, it accepts referrals for those aged 17.”

“Currently based in a two-room prefab in the grounds of Dublin’s St Columcille’s Hospital in Loughlinstown, the National Gender Service is the State’s only multidisciplinary clinical service for transgender healthcare.”

“While a lack of adequate space has been one festering problem at the NGS, so too has inadequate staffing numbers to cope with the huge demand for its service.

“Currently, the service has funding for an allocation of 12.5 clinical staff, but only 7.25 posts are occupied, according to figures supplied by Dr Paul Moran, consultant psychiatrist at the NGS.”

“Staff at the National Gender Service also told Prime Time of another risk affecting the organisation – from people opposed to the way their organisation handles referrals.

“NGS staff told Prime Time that they have been intrusively filmed while at work, insulted and abused on social media, and have had protests outside their workplace.

“Those incidents arise from an ongoing and vocal, campaign by transgender rights activists against the NGS’s Model of Care, which is based on an in-depth assessment of a client’s situation by a psychiatrist before treatment - if any - is recommended.”

“Transgender rights groups in Ireland, who support WPATH, say that adult patients should have a very strong – or even decisive - role in deciding their treatment pathway. That pathway may involve taking cross-sex hormones, or undergoing surgery to remove breasts or genitalia.

“The WPATH model was supported by the Fine Gael/Fianna Fáil/Green Party coalition in its 2020 Programme for Government. That document stated the government would ‘Create and implement a general health policy for Trans people, based on a best-practice model for care, in line with the World Professional Association of Transgender Healthcare (WPATH).’

“However, after questions were raised over the WPATH-supported model of care, including by clinicians at the NGS, the Fianna Fáil/Fine Gael 2025 Programme for Government included no reference to WPATH.”

“Earlier this month, a Labour Party motion proposed by Health Spokesperson Marie Sherlock TD was passed in Dáil Éireann without a vote being taken.”

“It called on the government to ‘provide a model of gender-affirming care in primary care settings, with a focus on General Practitioner-led (GP) care, based on informed consent as per WPATH and World Health Organization [WHO] guidelines and international best practice.’”

“She criticised the lengthy waiting times at the NGS, stating that ‘if you are trans and waiting for four years to see somebody, it leads to other outcomes in terms of self-medicating.’”

“[S]he said, ‘No country is perfect but we can learn a lot from Iceland, Malta, Spain and Australia. Malta is a small country like our own. It has shown the way. Its model is a de-pathologised model, building on maximising the health and psychological well-being of the individual.’”

In at least half a dozen states, librarians have joined forces with civil rights groups to oppose book bans, often facing personal and professional repercussions

For decades, libraries served as a safe haven for many queer and marginalized youths in eastern Texas, says former county library director Rhea Young. Unlike the school cafeteria, the library was a space where they could explore and find acceptance in who they wanted to be.

“There were books where they can find characters like them, and realize it’s okay to be who they are,” Young said. “There needs to be more places like that, not fewer.”

That all changed two summers ago when, amid a wave of book bans, Montgomery county officials asked Young to move books with LGBTQ+ themes or “sexually explicit” content at the public library into a section restricted to readers 18 years and older, and instructed her to order more titles with conservative Christian content.

Jose Antonio Kast Is transphobic.

Two of the UK's most prominent women's organizations, Girlguiding, and the Women's Institute, have announced they will bar transgender members, sparking debate.