Doctors’ union president apologises after saying incidents of sexual assault in medicine ‘not high’

Dr Antony Sara says it is ‘unacceptable’ that sexual harassment ‘remains distressingly prevalent’ for doctors at work

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The president of the doctors’ union, Dr Antony Sara, has apologised for comments he made that overall incidents of sexual assault in medicine are “not high”, and for describing findings from his own organisation’s research into the issue as “survey bias”.

A 2019 inquiry conducted by the Australian Salaried Medical Officers Federation (Asmof) into sexual harassment found 33% of all doctors had experienced sexual harassment at least once in their careers. Female doctors were consistently more likely to experience sexual harassment, and 70% of perpetrators were reported to be fellow doctors, the survey found.

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