Nazi human experimentation
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Nazi human experimentation was medical experimentation on large numbers of people by the German Nazi regime in its concentration camps during World War II,
Contents |
[edit] Overview
Dr. Josef Mengele was infamous for carrying out medical experiments on human subjects at Auschwitz. These included placing subjects in pressure chambers, testing various drugs on them, freezing them to death, and various other usually fatal traumas. Of particular interest to Mengele were twins, gypsies, dwarves and infants. Beginning in 1943, twins were selected and placed in special barracks.[citation needed]
Almost all of Mengele's experiments were of little scientific value, including attempts to change eye color by injecting chemicals into children's eyes, various amputations and other brutal surgeries, and in at least one case attempting to create artificial conjoined twins by sewing the veins of twins together. This operation was not successful and caused the children's hands to become badly infected.
The full extent of Mengele's work will never be known because the two truckloads of records he sent to Dr Otmar von Verschuer at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute were destroyed by the latter. Subjects who survived Mengele's experiments were almost always killed for dissection.
While Mengele's experiments were the most notorious, his behavior was not an isolated aberration. Other Nazi physicians also engaged in human experimentation at several concentration camps, including Dachau, Buchenwald, Ravensbrück, Sachsenhausen, and Natzweiler.
[edit] Experiments
According to the indictment at the Subsequent Nuremberg Trials, these experiments included:
- High altitude experiments. In early 1942 prisoners at Dachau concentration camp were used so the German Air Force (Luftwaffe) could find out the capacity of the human body to endure and survive high altitude. A low-pressure chamber containing these prisoners was used to simulate conditions at altitudes of up to 20 km (68,000 ft).
- Freezing experiments. Later in 1942 the Luftwaffe conducted experiments to learn how to treat hypothermia. One study forced subjects to endure a tank of ice water for up to three hours. Another study placed prisoners naked in the open for several hours with temperatures below freezing. The experimenters assessed different ways of rewarming survivors. [1]
- Malaria experiments. From about February 1942 to about April 1945 experiments were conducted at Dachau in order to investigate immunization for treatment of malaria. Healthy inmates were infected by mosquitoes or by injections of extracts of the mucous glands of mosquitoes. After contracting malaria the subjects were treated with various drugs to test their relative efficiency. Over 1,000 subjects were used in these experiments.
- LOST (mustard) gas experiments. At various times between September 1939 and April 1945 experiments were conducted at Sachsenhausen, Natzweiler, and other camps to investigate the most effective treatment of wounds caused by LOST gas, commonly known as mustard gas. Wounds were inflicted on the subjects, who were tested with LOST.
- Sulfonamide experiments. From about July 1942 to about September 1943 experiments to investigate the effectiveness of sulfonamide were conducted at Ravensbrück. Wounds inflicted on the subjects were infected with bacteria such as streptococcus, gas gangrene, and tetanus. Circulation of blood was interrupted by tying off blood vessels at both ends of the wound to create a condition similar to that of a battlefield wound. Infection was aggravated by forcing wood shavings and ground glass into the wounds. The infection was treated with sulfonamide and other drugs to determine their effectiveness.
- Bone, muscle, and nerve regeneration and bone transplantation experiments. From about September 1942 to about December 1943 experiments were conducted at Ravensbrück to study bone, muscle, and nerve regeneration, and bone transplantation from one person to another. Sections of bones, muscles, and nerves were removed from the subjects.
- Sea water experiments. From about July 1944 to about September 1944 experiments were conducted at Dachau to study various methods of making sea water drinkable. Some of the subjects were deprived of all food and given only chemically processed sea water.
- Epidemic jaundice experiments. From about June 1943 to about January 1945 experiments were conducted at Sachsenhausen and Natzweiler to investigate the causes of, and inoculations against, "epidemic jaundice" as hepatitis was then known. Experimental subjects were deliberately infected with hepatitis and various treatments were then tested on them.
- Sterilization experiments. From about March 1941 to about January 1945 sterilization experiments were conducted at Auschwitz and Ravensbrück, and other places. The purpose of these experiments was to develop a method of sterilization which would be suitable for sterilizing millions of people with a minimum of time and effort. These experiments were conducted by means of X-ray, surgery, and various drugs. Thousands of victims were sterilized. (Aside from its experimentation, the Nazi government sterilized around 400,000 individuals as part of its compulsory sterilization program.)
- Typhus (Fleckfieber) experiments. From about December 1941 to about February 1945 experiments were conducted to investigate the effectiveness of spotted fever and other vaccines. At Buchenwald numerous healthy inmates were deliberately infected with typhus bacteria in order to keep the bacteria alive; over 90% of the victims died. Other healthy inmates were used to determine the effectiveness of different spotted fever vaccines and of various chemical substances. In the course of these experiments 75% of the selected inmates were vaccinated with one of the vaccines or nourished with one of the chemical substances and, after a period of three to four weeks, were infected with spotted fever germs. The remaining 25% were infected without any previous protection, in order to compare the effectiveness of the vaccines and the chemical substances. Hundreds of the subjects died. Experiments with yellow fever, smallpox, typhus, paratyphus A and B, cholera, and diphtheria were also conducted. Similar experiments with like results were conducted at Natzweiler.
- Experiments with poison. In or about December 1943 and October 1944, experiments were conducted at Buchenwald to investigate the effect of various poisons. The poisons were secretly administered to experimental subjects in their food. The victims died as a result of the poison or were killed immediately in order to permit autopsies. In or about September 1944 experimental subjects were shot with poisoned bullets and suffered torture and death.
- Incendiary bomb experiments. From about November 1943 to about January 1944 experiments were conducted at Buchenwald to test the effect of various pharmaceutical preparations on phosphorus burns. These burns were inflicted on subjects with phosphorus matter taken from incendiary bombs.
After the war, these crimes were tried at what became known as the Doctors' Trial, and revulsion at the abuses perpetrated led to the development of the Nuremberg Code of medical ethics.
[edit] "Citations of shame": referring to Nazi results in later work
Unfortunately, some of these Nazi results are scientifically valid although they were got by totally unacceptable means. For the moral problems that this causes, see:-
- Citing Nazi ‘Research’: To Do So Without Condemnation Is Not Defensible #
- Citations of shame; scientists are still trading on Nazi atrocities
- Citations of shame; scientists are still trading on Nazi atrocities
- On the Ethics of Citing Nazi Research
- Remembering the Holocaust, Part 2
For example, the page marked # says that:-
- Of course, such data should be used only in the most exceptional circumstances and only in the absence of ethically derived data.
- John P. Fernandez, a hypothermia researcher, wrote in "Rapid active external rewarming in accidental hypothermia", Journal of the American Medical Association, volume 212, pages 153-6, 6 April 1970: "These sordid investigations proved to the satisfaction of the executioners that the best method of resuscitating hypothermia prisoners was by rapid and intensive rewarming."
- Science writer Kristine Moe (in "Should the Nazi research data be cited?", Hastings Center Report, volume 14, number 6, pages 5-7, 1984) praised that article as a model for the tone in which Nazi "research", if used, should be cited.
- What is certainly morally unacceptable is to cite Nazi data without any comment or qualification.
[edit] See also
- State Torture
- Doctors' Trial
- Human experimentation
- Nazi eugenics
- Nuremberg Trials
- Unit 731
- Dr. Josef Mengele
- Dr. Eduard Wirths
- Dr. Carl Clauberg
- Dr. Hubertus Strughold
- Dr. Fredric Hornsteble
- Japanese human experimentation on the Chinese
[edit] Further information
- Books
- Baumslag, N. (2005). Murderous Medicine : Nazi Doctors, Human Experimentation, and Typhus. Praeger Publishers ISBN 0-275-98312-9
- Weindling, P.J. (2005). Nazi Medicine and the Nuremberg Trials : From Medical War Crimes to Informed Consent. Palgrave Macmillan. ISBN 1-4039-3911-X
- Videos
- Michalczyk, John J. (1997). Nazi Medicine: In The Shadow Of The Reich
