During the
Second World War, the
Nazis conducted numerous
medical experiments on people who had been interned in the various
concentration camps, and
POW camps as well. These experiments were not only for the sake of either medical knowledge (very little of which was gained) or lust for murder, but rather the sheer, disgusting
sadism of those carrying them out.
Inmates of the various concentration camps in the
Third Reich, as well as captured POWs (mainly
Soviets), were subjected to terrible experiments by some 200 or so
German doctors. The actions of these twisted doctors were made completely public to the thousands of other doctors in
Germany, though not a single one publicly protested these experiments. Not even during or after the lectures that these death doctors gave in
Berlin in regards to their experiments did one give any sign of objection. Possibly this was due to their fear of
retribution on the part of the
SS, but serious questions about how the
Hippocratic Oath applies must be considered.
Some of the gruesome experiments included; placing prisoners in pressure chambers to subject them to high-altitude testing until they ceased breathing; injecting prisoners with lethal doses of
typhus, and
jaundice; subjecting prisoners to 'freezing' experiments in ice water, or exposed naked in the snow until they froze to death; prisoners were shot with poison bullets, as well as gassed with mustard gas; hundreds of
Polish women were given
gas gangrene wounds, and allowed to die while being studied; other Polish women were subjected to obscene bone grafting experiments;
Gypsies were given nothing but
salt water, to see how long they would survive; massive sterilization experiments were conducted, looking for a way to preserve the supposedly 'inferior' slave laborers of the Nazis, while preventing them from breeding; the study of skulls was undertaken by many
Third Reich doctors, who liked to study the skulls of the 'inferior races', the skulls were often sent to them with the flesh still around them...
The list of atrocities goes on and on.
Some of the more infamous
Nazi doctors:
Karl Gebhardt - Hanged
Fritz Fischer - Life in Prison
Adolf Pokorny - Acquitted
August Hirt - Hanged
Sigmund Rascher - Hanged
Edwin Katzenellenbogen - Life in Prison
Since the end of the war, there has been a debate on how much of the findings of these experiments should be looked at. The first argument is, "We should use this knowledge, however gruesomely it was attained, to help people in the present. Let not their sacrifices have been in vain". The counter-argument is, "By using this information, we would be admitting that these were valid experiments, and that course would not discourage it from happening again".
Some of the information regarding human survival in freezing water has since been studied and applied.