Doctor who repeatedly called for women to be raped suspended for six weeks

‘Some women deserve to be raped,’ Dr Christopher Kwan Chen Lee wrote

Royal Hobart Hospital, in Tasmania. (Google)

A doctor who repeatedly called for women to be raped has been suspended for six weeks.

Dr Christopher Kwan Chen Lee described himself as “a mongrel doctor who claims to know all manner of s*** on earth” in Singaporean online forums between 2016 and 2018, during which time he made a series of misogynistic and racist comments - some about his own wife.

The 31-year-old who worked in the Australian provinces of Victoria and Tasmania also boasted online that he could do whatever he wanted.

“It is rumored [sic] that his hospital in Australia has the highest casualties in the world due to him not attending to his dying patients,” the profile also said.

Commenting on a news story about an Egyptian lawyer sentenced to three years in jail for saying women who wear ripped jeans should be raped, Dr Lee wrote: “I’m surprised they didn’t give him a medal instead.”

Other comments included “some women deserve to be raped”, and “if my marriage fell apart, it would not end in divorce. It would end in murder”.

He also wrote: “I can just as easily condemn your mother for a whore (if the situation warranted it) as I can save your life or even hers.”

At the time the comments were made, Dr Lee was a registrar at the Royal Hobart Hospital but he has worked as an emergency registrar in Victoria since 2018.

The doctor admitted to the posts before the Tasmanian Health Practitioners Tribunal, which also heard how he was previously cautioned for accessing a Royal Hobart Hospital patient’s health records on 21 occasions between July 2015 and December 2016 without the patient’s consent or a clinical need.

Dr Lee, who graduated from the University of Melbourne in 2012, told the tribunal he was “relatively young and inexperienced” when he made the posts.

Dr Jay Weeraratne, who worked closely with him in Latrobe Regional Hospital’s emergency department in 2018 and 2019, wrote a letter of support for his colleague.

He described him as professional, punctual, and possessing an excellent worth ethic.

The tribunal chair, Robert Webster, said the posts were unacceptable.

He wrote in his decision: “The online posts convey socially unacceptable and extreme sentiments which are disrespectful of women and comment upon violence towards or sexual abuse of women. Some of the online posts might reasonably be interpreted as being racially discriminatory and contrary to acceptable social norms in Australia.

“All of the online posts had the potential to incite radical views, antagonise the reader and they had the potential to cause harm to the public.”

Mr Webster ordered Dr Lee be suspended for six weeks from May and that he undertake education on ethical behaviour and communications, particularly in the use of social media.