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One in three Swiss residents victims of discrimination

A crowd of people, some holding umbrellas of different colours.
A sizeable minority of individuals in Switzerland feel discriminated against. Keystone/Steffen Schmidt

Almost one in three people felt they had been the victim of discrimination between 2016 and 2022.  Discrimination occurred most often in the form of verbal and psychological violence.

These are the findings of a new survey by the Swiss Federal Statistical Office (FSO). It showed that last year, most victims of discrimination in Switzerland were disadvantaged because of their nationality, language, gender or origin.  

According to the “Discrimination and Racism in Switzerland 2023” survey, discrimination was mainly in the form of psychological and verbal violence. Over 40% of those discriminated against suffered from marginalisation, disregard or ridicule. Around a third stated that they had experienced verbal violence, insults and threats or bullying and insinuations.  

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According to the survey, almost half of the victims felt that they belonged less to society as a result of this discrimination. In addition, 40% experienced a deterioration in their relationship and a third avoided places or situations as a result. One-fifth of the victims reported a deterioration in their health.

Translated from German by DeepL/kc

This news story has been written and carefully fact-checked by an external editorial team. At SWI swissinfo.ch we select the most relevant news for an international audience and use automatic translation tools such as DeepL to translate it into English. Providing you with automatically translated news gives us the time to write more in-depth articles.  If you want to know more about how we work, have a look here, and if you have feedback on this news story please write to english@swissinfo.ch

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