EXTRACTS FROM THE AFFIDAVIT OF PROFESSOR OTTO LENZ, DIRECTOR OF THE ROBERT KOCH INSTITUTE IN BERLIN
Professor Rose was not the “typhus expert” of the Robert Koch Institute, nor did he work on typhus there. But he was the Chief of the Department of Tropical Medicine, and was in this capacity, with the exception of one field of research, (that of the transmission of dysentery and typhoid bacilli by insects) exclusively concerned with tropical diseases and parasites (insects).
The typhus expert of the institute was rather Professor Haagen, the Chief of the Virus Division. After his departure, following his appointment to the Chair of Hygiene at Strasbourg University, Professor Gildemeister, the then President of the Institute, continued the research on typhus.
Thus, various physicians, among them Dr. Ding, received instruction on typhus from Professor Haagen in the Virus Division, but not from Professor Rose.
Owing to the destruction by air raids of many of the files of the Robert Koch Institute, I can no longer ascertain whether Professor Rose was associated with the decisions taken on typhus experiments.
Several of the men who were at that time departmental chiefs, however, assured me unanimously, that this had not been the case.
Finally, nothing is known of Professor Rose’s having had the opportunity to become aware of Geheimrat Lockemann’s chemo-therapeutical experiments (chemo-therapy of abdominal typhoid with otrhomin). The only research on abdominal typhoid carried on in Rose’s department consisted of the experiments on the role of the house fly in the transmission of dysentery caused by bacteria and of abdominal typhoid.