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Peak psychiatry body suspends Dr Andrew Amos

The Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists (RANZCP) has temporarily withdrawn the membership of Dr Andrew Amos.

The move comes just weeks after the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency (Ahpra) blocked the psychiatrist from making further public statements about gender issues and restriced him from clinical contact with patients.

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Dr Andrew Amos.

Dr Amos has been a prominent campaigner against the gender‑affirming model of treatment for people experiencing gender dysphoria and a regular guest on conservative news channels. He was previously associated with James Cook University, but the institution says he is no longer connected to them.

The Queensland‑based psychiatrist has also spoken out against laws that outlaw conversion therapy, which prevent practitioners and religious bodies from urging people to resist changing gender. In an interview with Andrew Bolt on Sky News, he called for the laws to be repealed in Victoria and across Australia.

Dr Amos has argued in peer‑reviewed academic papers that the gender‑affirming care model used in Australia limits psychiatrists’ ability to treat mental illnesses that may be contributing to a person expressing a belief that they are transgender.

“The political goal of expanding personal liberty has been substituted for evidence‑based medicine processes of clinical reasoning, rendering the current gender‑affirming guidelines incompatible with competent, ethical medical practice,” Dr Amos said in a 2024 media release from James Cook University, where he was an academic.

A spokesperson for the university told OUTinPerth: “Dr Andrew Amos has no teaching or research position at James Cook University,” when approached about the restrictions imposed by Ahpra.

In an interview with The Australian newspaper Dr Amos said the RANZCP had denied him procedural fairness and not given him any notice of the cancelation of his membership.

“They had the authority to suspend me, but they also had the responsibility to provide procedural fairness, which they utterly failed to do,” he said.

A spokesperson for the RANZCP said they had made their decision based on the restrictions put in place by Ahpra.

“Under the college’s constitution, the board has a responsibility to act where a member’s right to practise is subject to regulatory restriction. This is an interim governance measure, taken to protect the integrity and standards of the college pending further review,” the spokesperson said.

Dr Amos has found support from the smaller National Association of Practising Psychiatrists (NAPP), which has a long history of opposing LGBTIQA+‑related reforms.

Dr Philip Morris, who leads the group, said his organisation advocated for a more cautious approach to gender treatment, arguing that many young people did not fully understand the consequences of being prescribed puberty blockers or cross‑sex hormone medication.

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