After describing deafness "as a scourge in our world," a prominent educator takes the heat from the deaf community.

Dr. Dimity Dornan, director of Brisbane-based organisation Hear and Say, was accepting an award when she made the remarks at Telstra's Queensland Businesswoman of the Year on Tuesday.

The Brisbane Times reported Ms. Dornan as saying: ''I think deafness is at the same stage polio was a few decades ago. It is a scourge in our world but it can be almost completely eradicated ...''

Reports of her acceptance speech have enraged several deaf and disability associations, including Deaf Victoria and the Deaf Association of New South Wales, which have both called on Ms. Dornan to apologise.

"The deaf community is angry and sees this as a form of cultural assimilation, similarly to what has happened, or attempted to happen, with the indigenous Australians. Dornan feels she can 'cure' deafness and confine it to history, when she has not considered the whole picture of the culture, the language and the lives of many deaf and hard-of-hearing people,'' said Deaf Victoria Manager Melissa Lowrie.

Meanwhile, Ms Dornan disputes the shorthand transcript. ''That is not exactly what I said, and that was not the meaning intended,'' she said. ''I used [the word scourge] only in reference to polio.''

The Age reported Telstra has removed video footage of the speech from its Web site and from YouTube and has refused calls from deaf protesters to reinstate the footage on the grounds that the contents could offend ''some groups in the community.''

Telstra refused to forward the video to The Age but maintained that Ms Dornan as the winner of the White Pages Community and Government Award.

However, YouTube user WomensAwards still has the video on Dr. Dornan's speech, which has been seen by IBTimes.

A FaceBook page called Stop Deaf Cultural Genocide was joined by 635 people to date, as online petitions are raised for the doctor to be prosecuted for vilification.