26/01/2023 | Writer: Aslı Alpar
Trans woman S.A. was subjected to transphobic discrimination by the infection secretary of Bakırköy Dr. Sadi Konuk Training and Research Hospital. The secretary said to S.A.: “I guess you are not aware of your physical appearance, I can’t look at your face.”
Trans woman S.A. was subjected to transphobic discrimination at the Bakırköy Dr. Sadi Konuk Training and Research Hospital in İstanbul, to where she went for getting examined on January 18, Wednesday.
Trans woman S.A., who had an appointment in the infection department of the hospital, went to the secretariat to register. S.A. told the health worker at the secretariat that she wanted to register however she couldn’t hear the response. Therefore she asked them to repeat the answer and the health worker said “I guess you are not aware of your physical appearance, I can’t look at your face.”
S.A. told her experience to KaosGL.org: “There is a glass wall between hospital staff and patients at the secretariat. It already blocks the sound, makes hearing difficult and the person working in the secretariat didn’t look at my face so I couldn’t understand what she said. When I asked her to repeat it, she told me that she didn’t want to look at my face due to my physical appearance.”
Hospital police didn’t get the complaint, police team didn’t come to hospital
The hospital police came over S.A., who wanted to videotape the discrimination she was exposed to, however he didn’t get her complaint.
S.A. told that she had called the police to press charges against the employee, who had discriminatory behaviors against her, and she had waited for the police to arrive for an hour at the hospital. However the police had not come to the scene and she had told that “your registration has been received” in response to her second call:
“I wanted to press charges against the hospital employee but the hospital police didn’t get my complaint. Then I called the police and waited for them, who said that they would come, for an hour at the hospital. In the meantime, they removed the health worker who insulted me and no one came to replace her, and they closed the counter. People / patients couldn’t use that counter for their process. I applied to the Patient Rights Unit of the hospital, I hope necessary action will be taken.”
“They tell us no to stay at home during transition, but we are exposed to discrimination when we go out”
S.A. told how she was affected by the discrimination she was exposed to as follows:
“I am at transition process. My doctors tell me not to stay at home to overcome the process, which is already difficult, more easily. However as soon as we go out, we experience this kind of incidents: defamation, discrimination… In my process, my family supports me, my beloved ones are with me, I have a regular life and a career. Even so the discrimination I was exposed to affected me calamitously. These forms of discrimination are much more severe for people who have to go through this process alone. We should not be exposed to discrimination.”
Translation: Selma Koçak
Tags: human rights, women, health
