LOS ANGELES, Sept. 17 (Xinhua) -- A report released Thursday by a U.S. civil rights group showed Asian Americans have experienced increased racism since the COVID-19 pandemic hit the country more than 6 months ago.

The report was issued by the Stop AAPI Hate Reporting Center, which was formed in March by the Asian Pacific Policy and Planning Council, Chinese for Affirmative Action and San Francisco State University's Asian American Studies department, and it collected reports of anti-Asian discrimination.

As of Aug. 5, the report said, 2,583 incidents of anti-Asian discrimination nationwide had been self-reported, in which over 40 percent, namely 1,116 reports, occurred in California.

Reports submitted to the group were likely under-counted, the report noted, citing that 5.4 percent of Asian Americans in California reported being "unfairly treated" due to race or ethnicity, compared to 2.1 percent of all state residents during pandemic, according to the 2020 California Health Interview Survey released earlier this month.

The report underlined the impact of racism and xenophobia against Asian-American youth during the COVID-19 pandemic, while analyzing 341 incidents of anti-Asian discrimination involving youth reported to the Stop AAPI Hate Reporting Center from March 19 to July 22, 2020.

"In over half (56 percent) of these cases, perpetrators employed anti-Chinese hate speech, including blaming China and Chinese as the source of the virus and mocking Chinese dietary habits. Even though adults were present in almost half of the incidents (48 percent), bystanders intervened in only 10 percent of the cases," the report said.

Tony Thurmond, California State Superintendent of Public Instruction, was quoted as saying that country is suffering two pandemics: COVID-19 and racism.

"It breaks my heart that so many of our Asian American and Pacific Islander youth and families have been subject to demeaning, discriminatory attacks," he said.

"All Asian Americans are being hit hard by the groundswell of anti-Asian rhetoric promoted by our president, but youth are particularly vulnerable," warned Russell Jeung, professor of Asian American studies at San Francisco State University. "The hate Asian-American youths are facing could cause irreparable damage to their self-identity and social relationships."