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MEMORIAL AND MUSEUM AUSCHWITZ-BIRKENAU FORMER GERMAN NAZI
CONCENTRATION AND EXTERMINATION CAMP

News

Online education session: Medicine at Auschwitz - 1 December

14-11-2022

The history of medicine at the German Nazi camp Auschwitz will be the subject of an online educational session on 1 December. It will be translated simultaneously into English.

Glass viols with brown liquid in a box
One of new drugs...
A drawing of SS medic injecting phenol into the heart of a half naked prisoner
Mieczysław...

The session will feature lectures by Dr. Piotr Setkiewicz, and Teresa Wontor-Cichy, historians from the Museum Research Centre, and Professor Hans Joachim Lang from the University of Tübingen. Testimonies of survivors concerning pseudo-medical experiments will also be presented.

Programme (TIME ZONE: CET, UTC+1)

16.00-16.05 | Inauguration of the session
Andrzej Kacorzyk, Director of the International Center for Education about Auschwitz and the Holocaust

16.05-16.50 | Lecture: Criminal Medicine. Medical experiments in KL Auschwitz.
Teresa Wontor-Cichy, Museum Research Center

BREAK

16:55-17:40 | Lecture: selections made by SS doctors in the hospitals of Auschwitz
Dr. Piotr Setkiewicz, Head of the Museum Research Center

BREAK

17:50-18:35 | Lecture: Murderous science. Selections at Auschwitz for the anatomical collections in Strasbourg
Prof. Hans Joachim Lang, University of Tübingen

18:35 - 19:00 | Excerpts from survivors' accounts regarding medical experiments

Participation in the session is free of charge. Registration is now closed.

During the war, many German doctors participated in criminal pseudo-medical experiments conducted on concentration camp prisoners. The experiments were planned at the central level to serve post-war plans (e.g. regarding population policy), to support racist theories (among others, by proclaiming the superiority of the Nordic race), or to serve the needs of the army (some of them aimed at improving the health of soldiers). Several doctors experimented on prisoners on behalf of German pharmaceutical companies, medical institutions or for reasons of personal interest and their scientific careers.