Driven to Death by 'Taeum': The Tragic Reality of Hospital Bullying

[26.06.30] "I Can Burn Rookies Until They Commit Suicide"… The Cruelty of 'Taeum' That Drove a 27-Year-Old Nurse to Death and the Structural Trap of Hospitals

"Taeum" (workplace bullying), a deep-rooted and chronic malady in the South Korean medical community, has swallowed yet another young nurse. The tragic passing of 27-year-old nurse Kang Su-bin, brought to light by an MBC report on the 29th, has ignited massive shock and public fury across society. Despite the tightening of relevant legislation since the issue of Taeum was thrust into the public eye in 2018, why do these systemic tragedies persist? This report deeply examines the superficial punitive systems, the perpetrator-centered institutional environment of hospitals, and the chronic understaffing that drives nurses into irreversible corners.

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1. "Every Single Day is Hell"… The 3-Year Nightmare of the Late Nurse Kang Su-bin

Kang Su-bin, who had dreamed of becoming a nurse since childhood, stepped into the hospital three years ago, proudly wearing her long-awaited nursing uniform. However, her excitement quickly dissolved into sheer terror as she was subjected to "Taeum" by senior nurses immediately upon arrival. Derived from the phrase "burning one's soul until it turns to ashes," Taeum refers to a toxic hazing ritual in hospitals where senior nurses subject rookies to verbal abuse, public humiliation, and social ostracization under the guise of clinical training.

The psychological violence Kang had to endure was beyond belief. In an open area witnessed by multiple colleagues, a senior nurse casually hurled a chilling threat: "I can burn rookies until they commit suicide." Kang's mother recalled with a breaking heart how her daughter would come home after shifts, lock herself in her room, and sob uncontrollably while recounting these experiences. Although the young nurse repeatedly told her mother, "If I just work harder and act more cheerful around the seniors, things will get better. Mom, I'll endure it a bit more; I will hang on," the hellish torment that dragged on for nearly three years was impossible to overcome through mere personal willpower.

The diary entries left behind by the deceased laid bare her lonely and agonizing struggle. She wrote, "They refuse to acknowledge my greetings. I kept greeting them as hard as I could, terrified that ignoring them would bring severe disadvantages," and "Every day feels like hell. But if I quit, I won't be able to pay my rent. I have no choice but to keep jumping right back into that hell." Trapped by the stark reality of financial survival, she felt forced to walk into the very environment that was systematically consuming her soul every single morning. Pushed past her absolute psychological breaking point, Kang finally resigned from the hospital in April last year.

2. A Mere 'Reprimand' as an Absolution: How Lenient Discipline and Institutional Apathy Betrayed the Victim

Following her resignation, Kang gathered the courage to file a workplace harassment complaint with the Ministry of Employment and Labor (MOEL). Although the investigation officially verified that workplace harassment had indeed occurred, the judicial framework and the hospital’s internal response utterly failed the victim. Out of the three individuals she named as abusers, only one was legally recognized as a perpetrator, and the hospital's internal disciplinary action against that individual was a mere "reprimand/admonition" (훈계).

Learning that the perpetrators who had pushed her to the brink of survival faced no tangible consequences and were continuing to work normally at the same hospital served as a final, crushing blow to Kang. Overwhelmed by deep despair, she took her own life early this month. In response to the tragedy, the hospital management issued a dismissive statement: "We offered a department transfer to the victim, but she declined it, and we fully completed all necessary actions in strict accordance with the corrective orders issued by the Ministry of Labor." While the hospital’s administrative paperwork was neatly resolved, a young nurse’s precious life was completely extinguished.

3. Hierarchy and Silence Backed by Data: The 2025 Nurse Human Rights Violation Survey

Following sequential deaths of nurses due to Taeum in 2018, the "Workplace Harassment Prohibition Act" was introduced and subsequently strengthened to hold employers legally accountable. However, this legal shield has proven largely ineffective on the ground. Deeply entrenched fears of being permanently blacklisted or targeted, coupled with anxieties over retaliation, continue to neutralize the legislative framework.

The quantitative data from the '2025 Nurse Human Rights Violation Survey' clearly demonstrates the grim reality of the current medical workspace:

Survey Metric (2025 Nurse Human Rights Survey)	Statistical Figure & Core Findings
Human Rights Violation Experience Rate (Past 1 Year)	50.8% (More than half of all respondents experienced abuse)
Rate of Inaction Following Abuse	71.8% (Took no action whatsoever due to fear of retaliation)
Primary Abuse Type & Main Perpetrators	Verbal abuse and structural bullying / Primarily perpetrated by senior nurses and physicians
Psychological Distress Indicators	65.3% seriously contemplated leave or resignation / 17.5% experienced actual suicidal ideation

4. Why Taeum Persists: The 'Structural Trap' of Hospitals That Breeds Abuse

Society frequently dismisses Taeum as an issue stemming from the malicious personality of individual abusers or a toxic localized team culture. However, medical experts emphasize that the core root of Taeum lies squarely within the dysfunctional structural design of hospitals. It is continuously reproduced by a destructive intersection of chronic understaffing, unmanageable workloads, a rigid military-style hierarchy, and the dangerous practice of throwing rookie nurses straight into high-stakes clinical environments without systematic onboarding or adequate training.

According to data from the Korean Nursing Association, the average number of patients assigned to a single nurse in South Korean medical institutions is 12. This is vastly higher when compared to developed nations like the United States (5.3 patients) or the United Kingdom (8.6 patients). In an environment where staff numbers are critically low and personnel are constantly managing life-or-death situations, senior nurses completely lose the temporal and emotional bandwidth required to patiently mentor new hires. Because a minor mistake by a rookie instantly translates to a direct threat to a patient's life and a massive spike in the senior's workload, training quickly devolves into aggressive hazing designed to force absolute submission. Ultimately, no matter how well-intentioned an individual may be, if the broader system remains broken, the personnel within it are systematically forced into abusive dynamics simply to survive.

Nurses' Patient Load Comparison by Country	Average Number of Patients per Nurse
South Korea	12.0 patients
United Kingdom	8.6 patients
United States	5.3 patients

This reality was explicitly validated in the precedent of Nurse Park, who tragically passed away after exposing Taeum in 2018. The Seoul Industrial Accident Compensation Insurance Committee officially recognized her death as an occupational hazard (industrial accident). The committee ruled: "The execution of high-stress duties under emergency conditions, a severely deficient training framework for new hires, and an excessive workload collectively eroded her psychological defense mechanisms, driving her to suicide." This represents a formal acknowledgement by a state organ that Taeum is not an individual conflict, but an institutional disaster engineered by the hospital system itself.

5. The Breaking Point of Emotional Labor: Without Systemic Overhaul, Tragedies Will Repeat

This structural contradiction is not unique to the nursing profession. The vast majority of service sectors that require intensive emotional labor—such as telemarketers, hotel managers, nail artists, and addiction counselors—face immense psychological exhaustion brought on by heavy workloads and irregular hours. The medical field, however, layers an extreme sense of responsibility over this foundation because it deals directly with human lives, magnifying the internal stress of the organization exponentially.

Whenever a horrific incident occurs, our society tends to hyper-focus on sensationalizing and vilifying the immediate abuser. While it is absolutely critical to hold perpetrators legally and socially accountable for their actions, restricting the blame entirely to the individual level allows the exploitative hospital system—which continuously breeds these abusers—to evade accountability entirely. The moment we conclude that "the person was the only problem," we permanently surrender the opportunity to fix the broken machinery. Alongside punishing individual perpetrators, it is well past time to enforce strict nurse-to-patient ratio laws and fundamentally overhaul clinical education frameworks to ensure that no more individuals are driven into irreversible corners.

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[🔍 Core Summary]

• Incident Overview: A 27-year-old nurse, Kang Su-bin, committed suicide after suffering from 'Taeum' for nearly 3 years, driven to despair by the lenient punishment ('reprimand') of her abusers who continued to work normally.
• Survey Data: The 2025 survey reveals 50.8% of nurses experienced human rights violations, but 71.8% remained silent due to fear of retaliation, while 17.5% experienced suicidal ideation.
• Structural Roots: South Korean nurses handle an average of 12 patients each—critically higher than the US (5.3) or UK (8.6)—creating a toxic environment where poor training frameworks normalize workplace bullying.
• Conclusion: Beyond punishing individual perpetrators, urgent legislative reform and structural staffing overhauls are required to stop the hospital system from evading institutional accountability.