Nazi experiments on people. What experiments did the Nazis conduct on people?

We can all agree that the Nazis did terrible things during World War II. The Holocaust was perhaps their most famous crime. But terrible and inhuman things happened in the concentration camps that most people did not know about. Prisoners of the camps were used as test subjects in a variety of experiments, which were very painful and usually resulted in death.

Experiments with blood clotting

Dr. Sigmund Rascher conducted blood clotting experiments on prisoners in the Dachau concentration camp. He created a drug, Polygal, which included beets and apple pectin. He believed that these tablets could help stop bleeding from battle wounds or during surgery.
Each test subject was given a tablet of this drug and shot in the neck or chest to test its effectiveness. Then the prisoners' limbs were amputated without anesthesia. Dr. Rusher created a company to produce these pills, which also employed prisoners.

Experiments with sulfa drugs

In the Ravensbrück concentration camp, the effectiveness of sulfonamides (or sulfonamide drugs) was tested on prisoners. Subjects were given incisions on the outside of their calves. Doctors then rubbed a mixture of bacteria into the open wounds and stitched them up. To simulate combat situations, glass shards were also inserted into the wounds.
However, this method turned out to be too soft compared to the conditions at the fronts. To simulate gunshot wounds, blood vessels were ligated on both sides to stop blood circulation. The prisoners were then given sulfa drugs. Despite the advances made in the scientific and pharmaceutical fields due to these experiments, prisoners suffered terrible pain, which led to severe injury or even death.

Freezing and hypothermia experiments

The German armies were ill-prepared for the cold they faced on the Eastern Front, from which thousands of soldiers died. As a result, Dr. Sigmund Rascher conducted experiments in Birkenau, Auschwitz and Dachau to find out two things: the time required for body temperature to drop and death, and methods for reviving frozen people.
Naked prisoners were either placed in a barrel of ice water or forced outside in sub-zero temperatures. Most of the victims died. Those who had just lost consciousness were subjected to painful revival procedures. To revive the subjects, they were placed under sunlight lamps that burned their skin, forced to copulate with women, injected with boiling water, or placed in baths of warm water (which turned out to be the most effective method).

Experiments with incendiary bombs

For three months in 1943 and 1944, Buchenwald prisoners were tested on the effectiveness of pharmaceuticals against phosphorus burns caused by incendiary bombs. The test subjects were specially burned with the phosphorus composition from these bombs, which was a very painful procedure. Prisoners suffered serious injuries during these experiments.

Experiments with sea water

Experiments were carried out on prisoners at Dachau to find ways to turn sea water into drinking water. The subjects were divided into four groups, the members of which went without water, drank sea water, drank sea water treated according to the Burke method, and drank sea water without salt.
Subjects were given food and drink assigned to their group. Prisoners who received seawater of one kind or another eventually began to suffer from severe diarrhea, convulsions, hallucinations, went crazy and eventually died.
In addition, subjects underwent liver needle biopsies or lumbar punctures to collect data. These procedures were painful and in most cases resulted in death.

Experiments with poisons

At Buchenwald, experiments were conducted on the effects of poisons on people. In 1943, prisoners were secretly injected with poisons.
Some died themselves from poisoned food. Others were killed for the sake of dissection. A year later, prisoners were shot with bullets filled with poison to speed up the collection of data. These test subjects experienced terrible torture.

Experiments with sterilization

As part of the extermination of all non-Aryans, Nazi doctors conducted mass sterilization experiments on prisoners of various concentration camps in search of the least labor-intensive and cheapest method of sterilization.
In one series of experiments, a chemical irritant was injected into women's reproductive organs to block the fallopian tubes. Some women have died after this procedure. Other women were killed for autopsies.
In a number of other experiments, prisoners were exposed to strong X-rays, which resulted in severe burns on the abdomen, groin and buttocks. They were also left with incurable ulcers. Some test subjects died.

Experiments on bone, muscle and nerve regeneration and bone transplantation

For about a year, experiments were carried out on prisoners in Ravensbrück to regenerate bones, muscles and nerves. Nerve surgeries involved removing segments of nerves from the lower extremities.
Experiments with bones involved breaking and setting bones in several places on the lower limbs. The fractures were not allowed to heal properly because doctors needed to study the healing process as well as test different healing methods.
Doctors also removed many fragments of the tibia from test subjects to study bone tissue regeneration. Bone transplants included transplanting fragments of the left tibia onto the right and vice versa. These experiments caused unbearable pain and severe injuries to the prisoners.

Experiments with typhus

From the end of 1941 to the beginning of 1945, doctors carried out experiments on prisoners of Buchenwald and Natzweiler in the interests of the German armed forces. They tested vaccines against typhus and other diseases.
Approximately 75% of test subjects were injected with trial typhus vaccines or other chemicals. They were injected with the virus. As a result, more than 90% of them died.
The remaining 25% of experimental subjects were injected with the virus without any prior protection. Most of them did not survive. Doctors also conducted experiments related to yellow fever, smallpox, typhoid, and other diseases. Hundreds of prisoners died, and many more suffered unbearable pain as a result.

Twin experiments and genetic experiments

The goal of the Holocaust was the elimination of all people of non-Aryan origin. Jews, blacks, Hispanics, homosexuals and other people who did not meet certain requirements were to be exterminated so that only the "superior" Aryan race remained. Genetic experiments were carried out to provide the Nazi Party with scientific evidence of Aryan superiority.
Dr. Josef Mengele (also known as the "Angel of Death") was greatly interested in twins. He separated them from the rest of the prisoners upon their arrival at Auschwitz. Every day the twins had to donate blood. The actual purpose of this procedure is unknown.
Experiments with twins were extensive. They had to be carefully examined and every inch of their body measured. Comparisons were then made to determine hereditary traits. Sometimes doctors performed massive blood transfusions from one twin to the other.
Since people of Aryan origin mostly had blue eyes, experiments were done with chemical drops or injections into the iris to create them. These procedures were very painful and led to infections and even blindness.
Injections and lumbar punctures were done without anesthesia. One twin was specifically infected with the disease, and the other was not. If one twin died, the other twin was killed and studied for comparison.
Amputations and organ removals were also performed without anesthesia. Most twins who ended up in concentration camps died in one way or another, and their autopsies were the last experiments.

Experiments with high altitudes

From March to August 1942, prisoners of the Dachau concentration camp were used as test subjects in experiments to test human endurance at high altitudes. The results of these experiments were supposed to help the German air force.
The test subjects were placed in a low-pressure chamber in which atmospheric conditions were created at altitudes of up to 21,000 meters. Most of the test subjects died, and the survivors suffered from various injuries from being at high altitudes.

Experiments with malaria

For more than three years, more than 1,000 Dachau prisoners were used in a series of experiments related to the search for a cure for malaria. Healthy prisoners became infected with mosquitoes or extracts from these mosquitoes.
Prisoners who fell ill with malaria were then treated with various drugs to test their effectiveness. Many prisoners died. The surviving prisoners suffered greatly and basically became disabled for the rest of their lives.

Auschwitz prisoners were released four months before the end of World War II. By that time there were few of them left. Almost one and a half million people died, most of them Jews. For several years, the investigation continued, which led to terrible discoveries: people not only died in gas chambers, but also became victims of Dr. Mengele, who used them as guinea pigs.

Auschwitz: the story of a city

A small Polish town in which more than a million innocent people were killed is called Auschwitz all over the world. We call it Auschwitz. Concentration camps, gas chamber experiments, torture, executions - all these words have been associated with the name of the city for more than 70 years.

It will sound quite strange in Russian Ich lebe in Auschwitz - “I live in Auschwitz.” Is it possible to live in Auschwitz? They learned about the experiments on women in the concentration camp after the end of the war. Over the years, new facts have been discovered. One is scarier than the other. The truth about the camp called shocked the whole world. Research continues today. Many books have been written and many films have been made on this topic. Auschwitz has become our symbol of painful, difficult death.

Where did mass murders of children take place and terrible experiments on women? In Which city do millions of people on earth associate with the phrase “death factory”? Auschwitz.

Experiments on people were carried out in a camp located near the city, which today is home to 40 thousand people. This is a calm town with a good climate. Auschwitz was first mentioned in historical documents in the twelfth century. In the 13th century there were already so many Germans here that their language began to prevail over Polish. In the 17th century, the city was captured by the Swedes. In 1918 it became Polish again. 20 years later, a camp was organized here, on the territory of which crimes took place, the likes of which humanity had never known.

Gas chamber or experiment

In the early forties, the answer to the question of where the Auschwitz concentration camp was located was known only to those who were doomed to death. Unless, of course, you take the SS men into account. Some prisoners, fortunately, survived. Later they talked about what happened within the walls of the Auschwitz concentration camp. Experiments on women and children, which were carried out by a man whose name terrified the prisoners, are a terrible truth that not everyone is ready to listen to.

The gas chamber is a terrible invention of the Nazis. But there are worse things. Krystyna Zywulska is one of the few who managed to leave Auschwitz alive. In her book of memoirs, she mentions an incident: a prisoner sentenced to death by Dr. Mengele does not go, but runs into the gas chamber. Because death from poisonous gas is not as terrible as the torment from the experiments of the same Mengele.

Creators of the "death factory"

So what is Auschwitz? This is a camp that was originally intended for political prisoners. The author of the idea is Erich Bach-Zalewski. This man had the rank of SS Gruppenführer, and during the Second World War he led punitive operations. With his light hand, dozens were sentenced to death. He took an active part in suppressing the uprising that occurred in Warsaw in 1944.

The SS Gruppenführer's assistants found a suitable location in a small Polish town. There were already military barracks here, and in addition, there was a well-established railway connection. In 1940, a man named He arrived here. He will be hanged near the gas chambers by decision of the Polish court. But this will happen two years after the end of the war. And then, in 1940, Hess liked these places. He took on the new business with great enthusiasm.

Inhabitants of the concentration camp

This camp did not immediately become a “death factory”. At first, mostly Polish prisoners were sent here. Only a year after the organization of the camp, the tradition of writing a serial number on the prisoner’s hand appeared. Every month more and more Jews were brought. By the end of Auschwitz, they made up 90% of the total number of prisoners. The number of SS men here also grew continuously. In total, the concentration camp received about six thousand overseers, punishers and other “specialists.” Many of them were put on trial. Some disappeared without a trace, including Joseph Mengele, whose experiments terrified prisoners for several years.

We will not give the exact number of Auschwitz victims here. Let's just say that more than two hundred children died in the camp. Most of them were sent to gas chambers. Some ended up in the hands of Josef Mengele. But this man was not the only one who conducted experiments on people. Another so-called doctor is Karl Clauberg.

Beginning in 1943, a huge number of prisoners were admitted to the camp. Most of them should have been destroyed. But the organizers of the concentration camp were practical people, and therefore decided to take advantage of the situation and use a certain part of the prisoners as material for research.

Karl Cauberg

This man supervised the experiments carried out on women. His victims were predominantly Jewish and Gypsy women. The experiments included organ removal, testing new drugs, and radiation. What kind of person is Karl Cauberg? Who is he? What kind of family did you grow up in, how was his life? And most importantly, where did the cruelty that goes beyond human understanding come from?

By the beginning of the war, Karl Cauberg was already 41 years old. In the twenties, he served as chief physician at the clinic at the University of Königsberg. Kaulberg was not a hereditary doctor. He was born into a family of artisans. Why he decided to connect his life with medicine is unknown. But there is evidence that he served as an infantryman in the First World War. Then he graduated from the University of Hamburg. Apparently, he was so fascinated by medicine that he abandoned his military career. But Kaulberg was not interested in healing, but in research. In the early forties, he began searching for the most practical way to sterilize women who were not of the Aryan race. To conduct experiments he was transferred to Auschwitz.

Kaulberg's experiments

The experiments consisted of introducing a special solution into the uterus, which led to serious disturbances. After the experiment, the reproductive organs were removed and sent to Berlin for further research. There is no data on exactly how many women became victims of this “scientist”. After the end of the war, he was captured, but soon, just seven years later, oddly enough, he was released under an agreement on the exchange of prisoners of war. Returning to Germany, Kaulberg did not suffer from remorse. On the contrary, he was proud of his “achievements in science.” As a result, he began to receive complaints from people who suffered from Nazism. He was arrested again in 1955. He spent even less time in prison this time. He died two years after his arrest.

Joseph Mengele

The prisoners nicknamed this man the “angel of death.” Josef Mengele personally met the trains with new prisoners and carried out the selection. Some were sent to gas chambers. Others go to work. He used others in his experiments. One of the Auschwitz prisoners described this man as follows: “Tall, with a pleasant appearance, he looks like a film actor.” He never raised his voice and spoke politely - and this terrified the prisoners.

From the biography of the Angel of Death

Josef Mengele was the son of a German entrepreneur. After graduating from high school, he studied medicine and anthropology. In the early thirties he joined the Nazi organization, but soon left it for health reasons. In 1932, Mengele joined the SS. During the war he served in the medical forces and even received the Iron Cross for bravery, but was wounded and declared unfit for service. Mengele spent several months in the hospital. After recovery, he was sent to Auschwitz, where he began his scientific activities.

Selection

Selecting victims for experiments was Mengele's favorite pastime. The doctor only needed one glance at the prisoner to determine his state of health. He sent most of the prisoners to gas chambers. And only a few prisoners managed to delay death. It was hard with those whom Mengele saw as “guinea pigs.”

Most likely, this person suffered from an extreme form of mental illness. He even enjoyed the thought that he had a huge number of human lives in his hands. That is why he was always next to the arriving train. Even when this was not required of him. His criminal actions were driven not only by the desire for scientific research, but also by the desire to rule. Just one word from him was enough to send tens or hundreds of people to the gas chambers. Those that were sent to laboratories became material for experiments. But what was the purpose of these experiments?

An invincible belief in the Aryan utopia, obvious mental deviations - these are the components of the personality of Joseph Mengele. All his experiments were aimed at creating a new means that could stop the reproduction of representatives of unwanted peoples. Mengele not only equated himself with God, he placed himself above him.

Joseph Mengele's experiments

The Angel of Death dissected babies and castrated boys and men. He performed the operations without anesthesia. Experiments on women involved high-voltage electric shocks. He conducted these experiments to test endurance. Mengele once sterilized several Polish nuns using X-rays. But the main passion of the “Doctor of Death” was experiments on twins and people with physical defects.

To each his own

On the gates of Auschwitz it was written: Arbeit macht frei, which means “work sets you free.” The words Jedem das Seine were also present here. Translated into Russian - “To each his own.” At the gates of Auschwitz, at the entrance to the camp in which more than a million people died, a saying of the ancient Greek sages appeared. The principle of justice was used by the SS as the motto of the most cruel idea in the entire history of mankind.

It is known that Nazi doctors conducted numerous experiments on prisoners of war and concentration camp prisoners. These were both men and women. Experiments were even carried out on Germans.

Experiments on prisoners in concentration camps are known for their unprecedented cruelty. Such experiments, by the way, were very diverse. The subjects could be placed in pressure chambers and then tested at different altitude conditions. This was done until people stopped breathing.

Experiments on prisoners in concentration camps were also carried out in other forms. People were injected with lethal doses of hepatitis and typhoid microbes. Freezing experiments were also carried out on them in very cold water.

Nazi Germany is notorious for the horrors of its concentration camps.

The horror of the Nazi camp system was terror and tyranny.

Scientific research was organized on a large scale.

People were taken naked into the cold until they froze.

They were also tested by poisoned bullets and mustard gas.

In the Ravensbrück concentration camp for women, hundreds of Polish girls were wounded and driven to gangrene.

Others were subjected to “experiments” in bone transplantation.

In Buchenwald, gypsies were selected and tested to see how long and how a person could live on salt water.

In many camps, experiments on sterilization of men and women were widely carried out.

The possibility of maintaining people's performance under conditions of excessive stress has been actively studied.

New drugs were also tested.

Experiments with malaria.

Experiments were also carried out with mustard gas.

Anastasia Spirina 13.04.2016

Doctors of the Third Reich
What experiments were performed on prisoners of Nazi concentration death camps for the sake of scientific discoveries?

On December 9, 1946, the so-called war begins in the city of Nuremberg. Nuremberg trial in the case of doctors. In the dock- doctors and lawyers who performed medical experiments on prisoners in SS labor camps. On August 20, 1947, the court made a decision: 16 of the 23 people were found guilty, seven of them were sentenced to death. The indictment alleges “crimes that included murder, atrocities, cruelty, torture and other inhumane acts.”

Anastasia Spirina sorted through the SS archives and found out why exactly the Nazi doctors were convicted.

Letter

From a letter from former prisoner W. Kling dated April 4, 1947 to Fraulein Frohwein, sister of SS Obersturmführer Ernst Frohwein, who from July 1942 to March 1943. was in the Saxenhausen concentration camp as the deputy first camp doctor, and later- SS Hauptsturmführer and adjutant to the imperial medical leader Conti.

“The fact that my brother was an SS man is not his fault, he was dragged in. He was a good German and wanted to do his duty. But he could never consider it his duty to participate in these crimes, which we only learned about now.”

I believe in the sincerity of your horror and in the no less sincerity of your indignation. From the point of view of real facts, it should be stated: it is undoubtedly true that your brother from the Hitler Youth organization, in which he was an activist, was “drawn” into the SS. The assertion of his “innocence” would only be true if it happened against his will. But this, of course, was not the case. Your brother was a “National Socialist”. Subjectively, he was not an opportunist, but, on the contrary, he was convinced, of course, of the correctness of his ideas and actions. He thought and acted the way hundreds of thousands of people of his generation and origin thought and acted in Germany.”…” He was a good surgeon and loved his specialty. He also possessed a quality that in Germany- due to its rarity among those who wore the uniform- called “civic courage.” “...”

I read in his eyes and heard from his lips that the impression these people made on him had at first dismayed him. All of them were more intelligent, treated each other more comradely, often in terribly difficult situations they showed themselves to be more courageous than the drunkards around him- SS men. “...” In the prisoner he saw- “privately”- “good fellow.”…” It was clear that beyond this point, SS officer Frohwein, loyal to his “Führer” and his leaders, would throw away delicacy. Here a split consciousness occurred...”

Whoever put on the SS uniform was registered as a criminal. He hid and stifled everything human that once was in him. For Obersturmführer Frohwein, this unpleasant side of his activity was precisely his “duty.” This was the duty of not only the “good”, but also the “best” German, for the latter was a member of the SS.

Fighting infectious diseases

“Since animal experiments do not provide a sufficiently complete assessment, experiments must be carried out on humans.”

In October 1941, block 46 was created in Buchenwald with the name “Typhus Test Station. Department for the Study of Typhus and Viruses" under the direction of the Institute of Hygiene of the SS Troops in Berlin. In the period from 1942 to 1945. More than 1,000 prisoners were used for these experiments, not only from the Buchenwald camp, but also from other places. Before arriving at Unit 46, no one knew that they would become test subjects. Selection for experiments was carried out according to an application sent to the camp commandant’s office, and execution was transferred to the camp doctor.

Block 46 was not only a place for conducting experiments, but also, in fact, a factory for the production of vaccines against typhoid and typhus. Bacterial cultures were needed to make vaccines against typhus. However, this was not absolutely necessary, since in institutes such experiments are carried out without growing the bacterial cultures themselves (researchers find typhoid patients from whom they can take blood for research). It was completely different here. In order to keep the bacteria active in order to constantly have biological poison for subsequent injections,Rickettsia cultures were transferredfrom a sick person to a healthy person through intravenous injections of infected blood. Thus, twelve different cultures of bacteria, designated by the initial letters Bu, were preserved there- Buchenwald, and go from “Buchenwald 1” to “Buchenwald 12”. Every month, four to six people were infected in this way, and most of them died as a result of this infection.

The vaccines used by the German army were not only produced in Block 46, but were obtained from Italy, Denmark, Romania, France and Poland. Healthy prisoners, whose physical condition through special nutrition was brought to the physical level of a Wehrmacht soldier, were used to determine the effectiveness of various typhus vaccines. All experimental subjects were divided into control and experimental objects. Experimental subjects received vaccinations, but control subjects, on the contrary, did not receive vaccinations. Then all objects in the corresponding experiment were subjected to the introduction of typhoid bacilli in various ways: they were injected subcutaneously, intramuscularly, intravenously and by scarification. The infectious dose that could cause the development of infection in the experimental subject was determined.

In block 46 there were large boards where tables were kept on which the results of a series of experiments with various vaccines were entered and temperature curves on which it was possible to trace how the disease developed and how much the vaccine could restrain its development. A medical history was made for each person.

After fourteen days (the maximum incubation period), people in the control group died. Prisoners who received various protective vaccinations died at different times, depending on the quality of the vaccines themselves. As soon as the experiment could be considered completed, the survivors, in accordance with the tradition of Block 46, were liquidated in the usual way of liquidation at the Buchenwald camp.- by injection 10 cm³ phenol to the heart area.

In Auschwitz, experiments were conducted to determine the existence of natural immunity against tuberculosis, the development of vaccines, and chemoprophylaxis with drugs such as nitroacridine and rutenol (a combination of the first drug with potent arsenic acid) was practiced. A method such as creating an artificial pneumothorax was tried. In Neuegamma, a certain Dr. Kurt Heismeier sought to disprove that tuberculosis was an infectious disease, arguing that only the “emaciated” body was susceptible to such infection and that the “racially inferior body of the Jews” was most susceptible. Two hundred subjects were injected with live Mycobacterium tuberculosis into their lungs, and twenty Jewish children infected with tuberculosis had their axillary lymph nodes removed for histological examination, leaving disfiguring scars.

The Nazis solved the problem of tuberculosis epidemics radically: With May 1942 to January 1944 all Poles who were found to have open and incurable, according to the decision of the official commission, forms of tuberculosis were isolated or killed under the pretext of protecting the health of Germans in Poland.

From approximately February 1942 to April 1945. At Dachau, malaria treatments were studied on more than 1,000 prisoners. Healthy prisoners in special quarters were subjected to bites from infected mosquitoes or injections of mosquito salivary gland extract.Dr. Klaus Schilling hoped to create a vaccine against malaria in this way. The antiprotozoal drug akrikhin was studied.

Similar experiments were carried out with other infectious diseases, such as yellow fever (in Sachsenhausen), smallpox, paratyphoid A and B, cholera and diphtheria.

Industrial concerns of that time took an active part in the experiments. Of these, the German concern IG Farben (one of whose subsidiaries is the current pharmaceutical company Bayer) played a special role. Scientific representatives of this concern traveled to concentration camps to test the effectiveness of new types of their products. IG Farben also produced tabun, sarin and Zyklon B during the war, which was mainly (about 95%) used for disinfestation purposes (elimination of lice- carriers of many infectious diseases, such as typhus), but this did not prevent it from being used for destruction in gas chambers.

To help the military

“People who still reject these experiments on people, preferring that because of this the valiant German soldiers were dying from the effects of hypothermia, I consider them to be traitors and state traitors, and I will not hesitate to name the names of these gentlemen in the appropriate authorities.”

— Reichsführer SS G. Himmler

Experiments for the air force began in May 1941 at Dachau under the auspices of Heinrich Himmler. Nazi doctors considered “military necessity” sufficient grounds for monstrous experiments. They justified their actions by saying that the prisoners were sentenced to death anyway.

The experiments were supervised by Dr. Sigmund Rascher.

During an experiment in a pressure chamber, a prisoner loses consciousness and then dies. Dachau, Germany, 1942

In the first series of experiments, changes occurring in the body under the influence of low and high atmospheric pressure were studied on two hundred prisoners. Using a pressure chamber, scientists simulated the conditions (temperature and nominal pressure) in which the pilot finds himself when the cabin depressurizes at altitudes of up to 20,000 m. Then, an autopsy of the victims was carried out, during which it was discovered that with a sharp decrease in pressure in the pilot’s cabin, nitrogen dissolved in the tissues began to be released into blood in the form of air bubbles. This led to blockage of blood vessels in various organs and the development of decompression sickness.

In August 1942, hypothermia experiments began, prompted by the question of rescuing pilots shot down by enemy fire in the icy waters of the North Sea. Test subjects (about three hundred people) were placed in water with a temperature of +2° up to +12°С in a full winter and summer set of pilot equipment. In one series of experiments, the occipital region (the projection of the brain stem where the vital centers are located) was out of water, while in another series of experiments the occipital region was immersed in water. The temperature in the stomach and rectum was measured electrically. Deaths occurred only if the occipital region was exposed to hypothermia along with the body. When the body temperature during these experiments reached 25°C, the experimental subject inevitably died, despite all attempts at rescue.

The question also arose about the best method of rescuing hypothermic victims. Several methods were tried: heating with lamps, irrigating the stomach, bladder and intestines with hot water, etc. The best way turned out to be placing the victim in a hot bath. The experiments were carried out as follows: 30 undressed people were outdoors for 9-14 hours, until their body temperature reached 27-29°C. They were then placed in a hot bath and, despite partially frostbitten hands and feet, the patient was completely warmed up within no more than one hour. There were no deaths in this series of experiments.

A victim of a Nazi medical experiment is immersed in icy water at the Dachau concentration camp. Dr. Rasher oversees the experiment. Germany, 1942

There was also interest in the method of warming with animal heat (the warmth of animals or humans). The experimental subjects were hypothermic in cold water of various temperatures (from +4 to +9°C). Removal from water was carried out when body temperature dropped to 30°C. At this temperature, subjects were always unconscious. A group of test subjects were placed in bed between two naked women, who had to press as closely as possible to the chilled person. The three faces were then covered with blankets. It turned out that warming with animal heat proceeded very slowly, but the return of consciousness occurred earlier than with other methods. Once they regained consciousness, people no longer lost it, but quickly learned their position and pressed themselves closely to the naked women. Test subjects whose physical condition allowed sexual intercourse warmed up noticeably faster; this result can be compared to warming up in a hot bath. It was concluded that warming severely cold people with animal heat can only be recommended in cases in which no other warming options are available, as well as for weak individuals who do not tolerate massive heat supply, for example, for infants, who are better They are generally warmed up near the mother’s body, supplemented with warming bottles. Rascher presented the results of his experiments in 1942 at the conference “Medical problems arising at sea and in winter.”

The results obtained during the experiments remain in demand, since repetition of these experiments is impossible in our time.Dr. John Hayward, an expert on hypothermia, stated: “I do not want to use these results, but there are no others and there will be no others in the ethical world.” Hayward himself conducted experiments on volunteers for several years, but he never allowed the body temperature of the participants to drop below 32.2° C. Experiments by Nazi doctors made it possible to achieve a figure of 26.5°C and below.

WITH July to September 1944for 90 Roma prisonersexperiments were carried out to create methods for desalinating sea water, led by Dr. Hans Eppinger. WITHThe subjects were deprived of any food, they were given only chemically treated sea water according to Eppinger’s own method. The experiments caused severe dehydration and subsequently- organ failure and death within 6-12 days. The gypsies were so deeply dehydrated that some of them licked the floors after they had been washed to get even a drop of fresh water.

When Himmler discovered that the cause of death for most SS soldiers on the battlefield was blood loss, he ordered Dr. Rascher to develop a blood coagulant to be administered to German soldiers before they went to war. At Dachau, Rascher tested his patented coagulant by observing the speed of drops of blood oozing from amputation stumps in living and conscious prisoners.

In addition, an effective and quick method of individually killing prisoners was developed. At the beginning of 1942, the Germans conducted experiments injecting air into veins with a syringe. They wanted to determine how much compressed air could be introduced into the blood without causing an embolism. Intravenous injections of oil, phenol, chloroform, gasoline, cyanide and hydrogen peroxide were also used. It was later discovered that death occurred faster if phenol was injected into the heart area.

December 1943 and September-October 1944 were distinguished by conducting experiments to study the influence of various poisons. At Buchenwald, poisons were added to prisoners' food, noodles or soup, and the development of a poisoning clinic was observed. In Sachsenhausen were heldexperiments on five people sentenced todeath with 7.65 mm bullets filled with aconitine nitrate in crystalline form. Each subject was shot in the upper left thigh. Death occurred 120 minutes after the shot.

Photo of a phosphorus burn.

The phosphorus-rubber incendiary bombs dropped on Germany caused burns to civilians and soldiers, the wounds from which did not heal well. For this reason, withFrom November 1943 to January 1944, experiments were carried out to test the effectiveness of pharmaceuticals in the treatment of phosphorus burns,which were supposed to ease their scarring. For this the experimental subjects were artificially burned with a phosphorus mass, which was taken from an English incendiary bomb found near Leipzig.

At various times between September 1939 and April 1945, experiments were conducted at Sachsenhaus, Natzweiler and other concentration camps to investigate the most effective treatment for wounds caused by mustard gas, also known as mustard gas.

In 1932, IG Farben was tasked with finding a dye (one of the main products produced by the conglomerate) that could act as an antibacterial drug. Such a drug was found- Prontosil, the first of the sulfonamides and the first antimicrobial drug before the era of antibiotics. Subsequently it was tested in experimentsGerhard Domagk, director of the Bayer Institute of Pathology and Bacteriology, who received the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1939.

Photo of the scarred leg of Ravensbrück survivor and Polish political prisoner Helena Hegier, who was subjected to medical experiments in 1942.

The effectiveness of sulfonamides and other drugs as a treatment for infected wounds in humans was tested from July 1942 to September 1943 in the Ravensbrück women's concentration camp.The wounds deliberately inflicted on the experimental subjects were infected with bacteria: streptococci, causative agents of gas gangrene and tetanus. To avoid the spread of infection, blood vessels were ligated from both edges of the wound. To simulate wounds received as a result of combat, Dr. Herta Oberheuser placed wood shavings, dirt, rusty nails, and glass shards into the wounds of experimental subjects, which significantly worsened the course of the wound and its healing.

Ravensbrück also carried out a series of experiments on bone transplants, muscle and nerve regeneration, and futile attempts to transplant limbs and organs from one victim to another.

From a letter from V. Kling:

The SS doctors we knew were executioners who discredited the medical profession to the point of impossibility. All of them were cynical murderers of a huge mass of people. Rewards and promotions were made depending on the number of their victims. There is not a single SS doctor who, while working in concentration camps, received his awards for his actual medical activities. “...”

Who the hell led or seduced whom? “Fuhrer”, the devil or some kind of god?

Is it true that “outside” no one knew about these crimes inside and outside the walls of the camps? The unassuming truth is that millions of Germans, fathers and mothers, sons and sisters, saw nothing criminal in these crimes. Millions of others understood this quite clearly, but pretended not to know anything,

and they succeeded in this miracle. The same millions are now horrified by the murderer of four million, [to Rudolf]Hess, who calmly stated before the court that he would have destroyed his closest relatives in the gas chamber if he had been ordered.

Sigmund Rascher was captured in 1944 on charges of deceiving the German nation and transported to Buchenwald, from where he was later transferred to Dachau. There he was shot in the back of the head by an unknown person a day before the liberation of the camp by the Allies.

Hertha Oberhauer was tried at Nuremberg and sentenced to 12 years in prison for crimes against humanity and war crimes.

Hans Epinger committed suicide a month before the Nuremberg trials.

To be continued

If you find a typo, highlight it and press Ctrl+Enter