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The Guardian - AU
The Guardian - AU
National
Melissa Davey Medical editor

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

Two female staff walk down a brightly lit hallway inside a hospital
The head of the Australian Salaried Medical Officers Federation has said his previous comments on ‘survey bias’ have ‘been seen to minimise the experience of doctors’. Photograph: Penny Stephens/The Guardian

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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