AMA representative claims asylum seekers on Nauru are worse off than Holocaust victims

An AMA doctor has compared Nauru to the Holocaust, because Jews about to be gassed by Nazis “found relief knowing what was happening”.

Dr Paul Bauert speaks to the media during a press conference at Parliament House. Picture: AAP

The paediatric representative from Australia’s peak medical body has suggested asylum seekers on Manus Island and Nauru are in a worse situation than Jews in Auschwitz because people who knew they were going to be gassed by the Nazis “found some sense of relief in knowing what was happening”.

Paul Bauert of the Australian Medical Association was among dozens of doctors who came to Parliament House in Canberra today to push Bill Shorten and his Labor team to stand firm in support of the Kerryn Phelps-inspired bill.

Mr Bauert said the mental health of detainees in Manus and Nauru had deteriorated because there was no certainty about their future.

“The main reason for the impairment of mental health — as Viktor Frankl the psychiatrist from Auschwitz described very well in his book Man’s Search for Meaning — the main problem that these people have is a lack of meaning, a lack of any end to what is going on, a lack of certainty,” Dr Bauert told Sky News.

The Australian Medical Association's Dr Paul Bauert on the medivac bill:

We know the main reason for the impairment of mental health is a 'lack of certainty' within detention. This is what is happening for those in offshore detention.

MORE: https://t.co/9fmbHelna2 #SkyLiveNow pic.twitter.com/4BLi82FGb4

— Sky News Australia (@SkyNewsAust) February 11, 2019

“And this more than anything causes severe mental health damage. Even those who finally knew they were about to be condemned to the gas chamber at least found some sense of relief in knowing what was happening.”

Dr Bauert said doctors were concerned the Opposition Leader would seek to water down the bill that passed the Senate in the last sitting week of 2018.

“Medical practitioners have been particularly concerned about the negative press that has been coming relating to Dr Phelps’ position,” Dr Bauert said.

“We are concerned there has been a watering down of what was achieved late last year in the Senate and there seems to be so much politicking going on at the expense of the health of a large number of people who are still on Manus and Nauru.

“While the politicking is going on these people continue to suffer and that is what has caused a lot of doctors to become incensed that there has been too much politicking over the last five years at least on this issue.“

Dr Bauert later apologised for the comments.

“My comments this morning were intended to reflect the writings of an eminent Jewish psychiatrist who survived Auschwitz. The words I used did not convey the complexity of what he wrote. My deep apologies for causing offence. Auschwitz was a humanitarian disgrace,” Dr Bauert said.

“I stand by my view that our current offshore detention policies are inhumane and needlessly cruel.”