Experiments with humans during Nazism
The Third Reic h took place between 1933 and 1945 in Germany, with the coming to power of National Socialist Workers Party of Germany . Its unquestionable leader, one of the most tragic historical characters: Adolf Hitler .
Experiments with humans in Nazism
During that historical period there were events that would mark history, such as the WWII , as well as the persecution and extermination of communists, Jews, homosexuals and gypsies .
One of the most unknown but equally macabre facets of the historical period of Nazi Germany is, without a doubt, the experiments that the doctors of the regime made with human persons as victims . Comparing the most immoral psychological experiments in history with Dr. Mengele's research, one realizes that the Stanford Prison experiment was practically child's play.
Today's society values doctors as those who specialize in healing people, avoiding pain, and procuring for their well-being and health. However, during the years of Nazism the doctors performed other functions. Many doctors and researchers were involved in experiments carried out in the concentration camps . A total of 15 of the 23 doctors accused of perpetrating these horrific experiments were found guilty during the trials in Germany after the Third Reich.
Hypothermia and freezing
The study of freezing in humans was carried out with the objective of simulate the conditions suffered by the military in the Eastern Front . Much of the army died because of very low temperatures, or because of pathologies associated with them, such as influenza or pneumonia. The experiment with humans provided the scientific basis to better predict the reaction of bodies to the cold and be able to use some variables to make soldiers more resistant to these conditions.
The investigations were commanded by the doctor Sigmund Rascher in the fields of Auschwitz, Birkenau and Dachau . In 1942, Rascher presented the results in a conference. On the one hand, it showed the time necessary for a human body to freeze until death, and on the other, resuscitation methods were studied for these cases.
The guinea pigs of these inhuman experiments were young Russians and Jews. They placed each of the victims in barrels of frozen water or left them completely naked in the open, suffering from freezing temperatures. His body temperature was measured by a probe placed in the rectum. The majority of young people died when their body temperature was below 26 degrees Celsius .
In addition, at the time they lost consciousness and were on the verge of death, researchers performed different experiments to try to revive them. These resuscitation attempts they caused great suffering in the subjects, who remained on the verge of collapse for long and endless minutes. They were placed under ultraviolet lamps that burned the skin, or they were irrigated with boiling water inside the body, a practice that made blisters appear, or they were placed in tubs of water that gradually warmed up.
Burns with chemicals
The field of Buchenwald it was also the scene of dreadful investigations. Prisoners were burned with phosphorus, mainly gypsies, to study the consequences of some chemical compounds in the human body .
Tests with high pressure at high altitudes
Probably one of the most brutal experiments was carried out by Sigmund Rascher, the same doctor who was the architect of the hypothermia investigations previously explained. Himmler , leader of the H.H , encouraged Rascher so that will investigate human behavior in extreme conditions of atmospheric pressure . He wanted to inquire about the maximum height at which the parachute soldiers and the pilots of the military planes could jump to the void without suffering damages.
Of the more than two hundred subjects who participated in the Rascher tests, seventy died.
When he was brought before the courts by the allies after the war, one of the most macabre investigations came to light. A report attested to Rascher's notes, which recounted the case of a 37-year-old Jew who was forced to jump from a height of 12,000 meters . After the third jump from that height, he suffered an agony and died after a few minutes.
Genetic experiments
The triumph of the Aryan race was one of the main objectives of the Nazis . The Aryan race, however, is a pseudoscientific concept that used Nazi propaganda to establish the foundations of a society in which this false ethnic origin marked the sieve between the human and the inhuman. From Nazism, the Aryans, popularly described as blond, with blue eyes and athletic complexion, should be erected as the pure race that would dominate the planet. People who did not fulfill these traits, little else that should be eliminated. The laws that regulated marriage were aimed at investigating racial origin and determining its purity.
In the concentration camps, multiple investigations were carried out in the field of genetics in order to improve the breed and understand the nature of the genetic defects. The most famous experiments were those carried out by the doctor Josef Mengele , who had gypsies and twin brothers as victims.
The nickname "Angel of Death" chose the subjects that would be investigated as soon as they got off the train when they arrived at the AusImagenchwitz field , based on certain physical defects or oddities that might interest you.
Mengele received the intellectual support of the Institute Kaiser Wilhelm of Anthropology, Eugenics and Genetics in Dahlem, and sent the reports of his research to Dr. Von Verschuer, who from the University of Frankfurt tutoring him from his deep knowledge in the field of genetics of twins.
With the twin brothers that he used for his studies, Josef Mengele studied them for a few weeks, and when he had submitted them to the relevant tests, administered a lethal injection of chloroform directly to the heart .
Other scary evidence
In the dreary rooms of the concentration camps other investigations and evidence of unusual violence were carried out: torture during interrogation, administration of injections containing viruses to humans , forced sterilization and study for the advancement in surgical techniques.
Without going any further, the Dr. Kurt Heissmeyer he was the architect in administration of tuberculosis-infected injections to prisoners in the Neungamme concentration camp . Some of these prisoners were also exposed to phosgene gas in order to conduct research to find an antidote for poisoning, since phosgene gas had been used as a biological weapon during World War II.
The prisoners who were victims of investigations were also mutilated and then tried to transplant the limbs in another prisoner, also mutilated. The objective was to discover if it was possible to transplant arms or legs, but the methodology used was terribly cruel, and the few prisoners who did not die were mutilated. The experiment did not achieve any conclusive results.
Another macabre idea was born from the doctor Hans Eppinger , who was trying to discover a way to purify the sea water. He kept several gypsies deprived of food and water, and forced them to drink only seawater. As a result, Great part of the gypsies developed severe pathologies .
In the concentration camps poisonings by injections or food intake were common. Experiments were also experimented with in vitro insemination in women, reaching the idea that they had injected sperm from different animals to create a monster.
Ethical reflections
These experiments carried out during Nazism raised in the future decisive reflections of what should be the experimentation with humans and their ethical limits . The barbarism supplied by doctors such as Mengele or Heissmeyer is an unfortunate memory of the unreason that led tens of thousands of victims to be tortured in the name of a science devoid of any ethics.
