Gold Coast surgeon Dr Rhea Liang (pictured) was racially abused at work
The coronavirus outbreak is fueling racism against Asian-Australians, according to doctors.
The deadly disease reached Australia last month and has since infected 13 people in the country.
Doctors testing patients for the virus say they have witnessed racism against Australians of Asian heritage because it originated in Wuhan, China where it has killed around 500 people.
They say people have come to hospital with concerns they will catch the virus after having a Chinese takeaway or sitting next to an Asian person on the bus.
Gold Coast surgeon Dr Rhea Liang posted a tweet last week saying she was racially abused by a patient.
She wrote: ‘Today a patient made jokes about not shaking my hand because of coronavirus. In front of my team.
‘I have not left Australia. This is not sensible public health precautions. This is racism.’
Responding to her tweet, other doctors shared their experiences of racism.
Adelaide head and neck surgeon Guy Rees wrote: ‘Patients [are] asking if they could get ‘corona’ by seeing a Chinese person or having a Chinese takeaway.’
Hundreds of people rushed to support Dr Rhea. ‘I am horrified by your experience,’ wrote one. ‘Oh Rhea I’m so sorry,’ said another.
Dr Rhea, who grew up in Auckland before moving to the Gold Coast, told Daily Mail Australia she was ‘surprised and gratified by the largely supportive response’.
Gold Coast surgeon Dr Rhea Liang posted a tweet (above) last week saying she was racially abused by a patient
Dr Simon Judkins, of the Australasian College of Emergency Medicine, said he too has witnessed racism against Chinese Australians.
‘We’ve seen people turn up saying they are worried they may have coronavirus because they sat on a bus next to someone of Asia appearance,’ he told ABC program The World Today.
‘We’ve having reports of staff being asked by patients whether they’ve been home lately even though they were born and raised in Australia.’
Dr Lai Heng Foong, an emergency doctor in Sydney, said one mother feared her child may catch the disease simply because he goes to school with Asian children.
He told the program: ‘The mother brought in her child who was about six. She said “my child goes to school with a lot of Asian people I just want to check to make sure that he doesn’t have coronavirus”.’
‘He didn’t even have any cough or fever, just happened to be [on his] first day back at school’.
Restaurants in South Korea, Japan, Hong Kong and Vietnam (pictured) have refused to accept Chinese customers
French Asians are using a hashtag ‘I am not a virus’ in an effort to counter racist abuse
It is not only doctors who have reported witnessing racism.
Sydney resident Angela Prendergast told Guardian Australia she saw a young Asian mother with a baby in a pram being abused on a train by a middle-aged white woman who told her to stand in the corner of the carriage.
She said: ‘I heard her yelling “You need to cough over there. You need to stop coughing. That’s how viruses get spread”.’
Chin Tan, Race Commissioner at the Australian Human Rights Commission, said the Chinese community is ‘really suffering’ from racism due to the coronavirus.
‘The Chinese community is really suffering because of victimisation and conduct that seems to profile the Chinese community. It’s not fair and it’s not helpful,’ he told The World Today.
Chinese citizens have faced a racist backlash across the world following the outbreak of the deadly coronavirus.
Restaurants in South Korea, Japan, Hong Kong and Vietnam have refused to accept Chinese customers.
Indonesians marched near a hotel and called on Chinese guests there to leave.
Chinese and other Asians in Europe, the United States, Asia and the Pacific complained of racism.
French Asians have taken to social media to vent their anger, with the hashtag ‘JeNeSuisPasUnVirus’ (‘IAmNotAVirus’) trending last week.
Passengers wear protective face masks as they arrive in Hong Kong after getting the train from Shenzhen