The NHS is supposed to be for everyone, so why are Jewish people facing unimaginable abuse
Our new documentary shows why Jewish people are no longer able to place that faith and trust in the NHS, writes Campaign Against Antisemitism's Stephen Silverman
When people interact with the NHS, they are often at their most vulnerable and frightened.
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By Stephen Silverman, Director of Investigations and Enforcement at Campaign Against Antisemitism
We place enormous faith and trust in the relationship between patient and provider.
Our new documentary, titled ‘Malignant: Antisemitism in the NHS’, shows why Jewish people are no longer able to place that faith and trust in the NHS.
The film exposes the antisemitic rot at the heart of our national healthcare provider, and makes for difficult viewing.
The scale and severity of this institutional crisis are staggering. We heard from patients and practitioners about how the NHS had failed them: a Jewish nurse subjected to a Nazi salute; antisemitic abuse to a Jewish patient during surgery on his head; a senior Jewish medical professor receiving antisemitic death threats; a Jewish patient being treated by a leader of a now-proscribed Islamist terrorist organisation; a Jewish emergency worker being physically attacked by a colleague; the list goes on.
These people were let down by the entire apparatus of the NHS: the individual doctors and nurses who engaged in antisemitic behaviour, the trusts that employed them and failed to apply their disciplinary processes transparently, and the regulators meant to hold them to account. The documentary even shows a senior member of the GMC telling a gathering how complaints about antisemitism are routinely shut down.
These are not isolated stories. According to our new representative polling, presented in our documentary for the first time, a majority of British Jews are concerned about not receiving equal care because they are Jewish. Since the brutal Hamas terrorist attacks on 7th October 2023, one in three British Jews who have used the NHS say they felt uncomfortable because of their Jewish identity, and more than four in ten took steps to hide it. These are appalling statistics, particularly given that in a medical setting you need to be prepared to reveal sensitive personal information in order to receive the care you need. The figures lay bare just how unsafe British Jews now feel within a system that is supposed to heal them, not make them feel worse.
It is galling that at the very moment they need the NHS most, Jewish people are having to hide their identity for fear of unequal treatment or abuse, instead of being able to trust our national healthcare provider.
This crisis demands a wide-ranging response: one that confronts the growing extremist culture within healthcare, the abysmal failure of regulation, the shocking lack of transparency, and the total absence of accountability.
We cannot accept politicians pointing to past reviews and recommendations that went nowhere: we need real, robust action now. That is why we will also be presenting a detailed plan to address this national scandal – one that requires practitioners, trusts, regulators and Government alike to act.
The NHS is supposed to be a promise: that whoever you are, and whatever you believe, you will receive the same standard of care as anyone else. For British Jews, that promise is being broken. Until this is rectified, the NHS cannot be said to be for everyone.
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Stephen Silverman is Director of Investigations and Enforcement at Campaign Against Antisemitism.
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