Following the controversial Prime Time documentary which aired on RTÉ television on Thursday, December 14, Dr Aidan Kelly, one of the clinical psychologists who was interviewed on the show, has condemned the approach taken by the programme makers.

The documentary was heavily criticised by many LGBTQ+ community organisations, who insist that Irish trans youth deserve access to evidence-based treatment and transgender healthcare, including puberty blockers.

In his criticism, Ruadhán Ó Críodáin from ShoutOut warned, “In the context of increased disinformation around LGBTI+ identities, the media must be more responsible in their coverage of trans issues. These debates cause immense harm to trans people.”

Believing the Prime Time coverage to be biased, Mammies for Trans Rights said they would love to see RTÉ give equal airtime “to the happy, healthy, joyful lives” of trans people across Ireland. They also credited the “clinicians and groups who support them with kindness and love.”

TENI (Transgender Equality Network Ireland) also issued a statement on social media asserting that the comments they had furnished to RTÉ were ignored in the documentary and published their full comments online for transparency.

In a statement issued to GCN, Dr Kelly, Director of Gender Plus, outlined how he felt his contribution was disproportionate to the other two physicians who appeared to be advocating for a more restrictive model of gender-affirming healthcare to be applied to young trans people.

He suggests that when he was approached by RTÉ to participate in the Prime Time investigation, he was misguided into thinking the production would adopt a more balanced discourse. 

He also asserts that the show “shunned” the idea of developing a “respectful and compassionate” approach to gender-affirming healthcare and ignored “the harm being done to gender-questioning young people who have been left with no provision of care whatsoever.”

You can read Dr Kelly’s full statement below:

In November, I was invited to contribute to an RTÉ Prime Time report, which promised to explore healthcare for transgender children in Ireland.

The interview, I was told, would focus mainly on the following areas:

• the options for children in Ireland requiring treatment
• the quality of services available in recent years (including the Tavistock)
• the advantages and disadvantages of following the WPATH affirming model of care
• and my view on the relatively recent increase in young people questioning their gender.

Given the current healthcare crisis facing this patient cohort, and this being my specific area of expertise, I agreed. For context, I have worked almost exclusively in the field of child and adolescent transgender healthcare since 2016, and I am the director of an Ireland-based gender service that receives approximately 10 Irish referrals each month, most of which are under 18.

The programme aired on December 14. Perhaps the content should not have come as a surprise, given the ongoing media narrative when it comes to discussing the topic of trans healthcare.

The show shunned the aforementioned approach and instead adopted the often repeated narrative that vulnerable children are being facilitated down a pathway of medical treatment for their gender needs and, in doing so, are being harmed.

There was absolutely no mention of the harm being done to those gender-questioning young people who have been left with no provision of care whatsoever, which I believe is the real story here.

One of the biggest challenges we face working in this area of healthcare is that it is complex and nuanced. Boiling it down to the key component parts is difficult. This is exacerbated by the involvement of those who are positioned as experts despite having very little knowledge about the actual clinical work involved with treating this patient cohort.

As the only interviewee focused specifically on young people, I was confident that I would be given an equal platform (to the other physicians, both of whom work primarily in the field of adult healthcare). However, despite my credentials, the 90 minutes I spent talking with the RTÉ crew during the filming process was cut to less than one minute.

It was also telling that, despite the focus of the piece now being the perceived dangers of gender-affirming care, the crew had to travel to the north of England to find a patient that fit their profile.

Had they sought out examples of people who had benefited from access to gender-affirming care, I would have happily connected them with young people and families who could speak to their positive experiences (both those who have accessed medical treatments and those who ultimately did not).

Throughout the programme, there was little doubt that the term “gender-affirming care” was used in a pejorative way, and yet there is no agreed-upon definition of how that care is defined.

At Gender Plus, we recognise gender-affirming care as being respectful and compassionate of the person’s identity while also holding a developmental approach that understands that gender expression may change over time.

We believe that a clinical care plan should be developed in collaboration with the patient and that there should be no preference to deliver one gender identity outcome over another. Incidentally, this approach is in line with best practice the world over, something which the programme failed to mention.

This discussion is all too often polarised and sensationalised and the young people and the families that this affects the most, and who are ultimately the ones who matter in the conversation, are forgotten and overlooked.

RTÉ Prime Time had an opportunity to shine a light on the reality of their situation, but instead, it chose to perpetuate more harmful rhetoric, which only creates further barriers to care for this patient cohort.

Dr Aidan Kelly,
Clinical Psychologist and Director of Gender Plus
December 17, 2023