Patients Refusing to Be Treated by Non-White Staff as NHS Reports Shocking Rise in Racism

NHS staff have been called “dirty foreigners” and “monkeys” amid a “noticeable” and “unacceptable” rise in racism from patients, a survey has found.

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Some have even been refused to be treated by non-white staff, a poll of its members revealed.

A sonographer in the Midlands, of Asian descent, said several patients have said to her: “This country isn’t the same, with all those people coming over here, taking our jobs.”

She said such incidents had become “more prevalent”, blaming “the media and certain political parties” where people “are openly expressing” such views.

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Other incidents raised in the SoR survey include:

– “Some patients always complain about the colour of skin of people attending them,” said one worker.

– One radiographer spoke of “patients describing healthcare staff as dirty foreigners”.

– Another said: “I have witnessed a colleague being called a monkey by a patient.”

– A white man allegedly refused to let a sonographer scan his pregnant wife, telling the staff: “I don’t want anyone from any ethnic background touching my woman.”

– And another patient refused to let a black radiographer perform their chest X-ray, as “black people frighten me”.

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