# Antisemitism in health care

Antisemitism in health care has been documented by scholars since before the Holocaust, during which doctors and nurses participated in atrocities against Jewish victims. Discrimination against Jews and episodes of anti-Jewish hate in health care settings have been documented through the decades.

## History
### Medieval and early modern Europe

Some antisemitic conspiracies in medieval and early modern Europe took the form of fearing Jewish (or suspected Jewish) doctors. This fear seemed to be especially strong in 17th and 18th century Iberia, with conversos (Jews who had converted to Catholicism) often being targeted. For example, one Portuguese author, in his 1622 work Breve discurso contra a heretica perfidia do judaismo, suggests that Jewish people who had pretended to convert to Christianity were entering medicine so they could kill Catholics. However, this idea also persisted in other parts of early modern Europe, such as Germany.
The Middle Ages also gave rise to the idea that Jewish people were particularly inclined to developing mental illnesses or other diseases and disorders; this idea persisted into the 19th century.$^{:4}$

### 19th-20th-century Canada

In Canada, antisemitic social and economic boycotts, along with educational quotas, have been described from the 19th through the mid-20th century.
In June 1934, interns at Notre Dame Hospital in Montreal began a strike after Jewish doctor Samuel Rabinovitch was hired at the hospital; the strike ended when Rabinovitch resigned four days later.

### 20th-century Germany

The fear of Jewish physicians continued to be stoked in 20th-century Germany; Hedy Wald noted that the lead-up to the Holocaust featured the persecution and ostracizing of Jewish doctors.

### 20th-century United States

Quotas limiting admissions of Jews into medical schools reportedly existed in the United States from the 1920s until around 1970. Two episodes of antisemitic violence, one in 1916 and one in 1927, were connected to American medical schools during this time, both taking place in New York.

## 21st century

After the October 7 Hamas-led attack on Israel, Hedy Wald, Steven Roth, and others decried medical articles which they perceived as “political indictment cloaked in academic language.” They connected surging anti-Israel rhetoric with an increasingly hostile environment for Jewish students and faculty at medical schools, Wald characterized a letter to US President Joe Biden from a group of doctors who worked in Gaza during the Gaza war as antisemitic, and included the wearing of keffiyehs as an antisemitic act in her studies. She cited examples of medical students and faculty tearing down hostage posters, accusing Jewish students of complicity with genocide, engaging in Holocaust distortion and inversion, and disrupting commencement ceremonies.
In a 2025 survey, a majority of Jewish-identifying medical students and professionals (75.4%) reported workplace exposure to antisemitism.

### 2025 Sydney nurses anti-Israel remarks

On 12 February, 2025, a video chat between Israeli influencer Max Veifer and two nurses led to widespread criticism and a police investigation, after the nurses said they would kill Israeli patients and refuse to treat them. After learning Veifer was Israeli, the male nurse said he would go to Hell. The female nurse said he would face a "horrible death" for being in the Israel Defense Force, and later said she would refuse to treat Israeli patients and would kill them. The male nurse said he had already killed several Israeli patients.
The incident was widely condemned as antisemitic, including by Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, NSW Premier Chris Minns, NSW Health Minister Ryan Park, NSW Police Commissioner Karen Webb, and other healthcare workers. Liberal MP Julian Leeser said Australia's Jewish community was "living in fear" of rising antisemitism, and Alex Ryvchin of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry said the video was "utterly sickening to watch".
The nurses had their licenses suspended across Australia. The male nurse said the incident had been "just a joke" and was "a misunderstanding". His solicitor said the nurse had sent an apology to Veifer and the Jewish community "as a whole", and was "trying to make amends". After an internal investigation, the hospital said there was no evidence of "adverse outcomes" for patients.
NSW Police officers have conducted investigations into the incident and are working with Veifer to present a witness statement admissible in the Australian court, since the video was made in Israel. On 26 February, the female nurse was charged with three federal offenses: threatening violence, using a carriage service to threaten to kill, and using a carriage service to menace, harass or offend. She was also banned from social media and from leaving Australia. On 5 March, the male nurse was charged with two offenses: using a carriage service to menace, harass or cause offense, and possession of a prohibited drug (morphine).

#### Responses

In response to the incident, the New South Wales Nurses and Midwives' Association held a demonstration outside NSW parliament to condemn "all forms of racism, bigotry and hatred, including acts of antisemitism and Islamophobia". In the aftermath of the incident, another nurse at Bankstown Hospital said she had previously raised concerns about antisemitism at the hospital after the 7 October 2023 Hamas-led attack on Israel.
A coalition of Islamic organizations, including Hizb Ut-Tahrir and The Muslim Vote, released a joint statement that said media outlets and political leaders had provided "active diplomatic and journalistic cover for ongoing crimes by the Zionists" and described the public response as "selective outrage" and "weaponization of antisemitism". Western Australian Senator Fatima Payman described the nurses' remarks as "terrible" and said they were being treated as though they had "committed the absolute worst crime imaginable".

## Corrective approaches

The international Lancet commission on Medicine and the Holocaust has outlined objectives for medical educators to include in curricula.
Hedy Wald advocates for 4 E's to combat antisemitism, which can be incorporated into DEI programs: education, engagement, empathy and enforcement. These include disseminating information about the historic roles of Nazi and Nazi-supporting doctors and nurses; fostering respectful dialogue and personal connections in medical communities; and establishing policies to oppose hate speech and promote nondiscrimination. Wald developed a Holocaust and medicine course at several medical campuses.