After the meeting of consulting physicians had ended, Gebhardt returned to Ravensbrueck and conducted several more series of sulfanilamide experiments. The subjects used for the later experiments were Polish women who had been condemned to Ravensbrueck without trial, and who did not give their consent to act as experimental subjects. Three of these were killed by the experiments.
TYPHUS EXPERIMENTS
Under counts two and three of the indictment Handloser is charged with special responsibility for, and participation in, typhus experiments conducted in the Buchenwald concentration camp which were supervised by a certain Dr. Ding, and like experiments conducted in the Natzweiler concentration camp by a certain Dr. Haagen. As shown elsewhere in the judgment, these experiments were unlawful and resulted in deaths of non-German nationals.
There can be no question but that in 1941 typhus was a potential menace to the German Army and to many German civilians. The use of an adequate typhus vaccine was therefore a matter of prime importance. The distribution of vaccines to the Wehrmacht was within the control of Handloser. In the exercise of his functions he was also interested in typhus vaccine production.
The Typhus and Virus Institutes of the OKH at Cracow [Krakow] and Lemberg [Lvov] were engaged in the production of the Weigl vaccine from the intestines of lice. This vaccine was thought to be effective, but the production procedure was complicated and expensive; hence, sufficient quantities of this vaccine could not be furnished. Another vaccine—the so-called Cox-Haagen-Gildemeister vaccine, produced from egg-yolk cultures—could be quickly produced in large quantities, but its protective qualities had not been sufficiently demonstrated.
Evidence is before the Tribunal that the general problem was discussed at a meeting held in Berlin, 29 December 1941, attended by Dr. Bieber of the Ministry of Interior; Gildemeister; Dr. Scholz, a subordinate of Handloser; two physicians of the “governing body of the Government General”; and three representatives of the Behring Works. It is stated in the minutes of this conference that—
“The vaccine which is presently being produced by the Behring Works from chicken eggs shall be tested for its effectiveness in an experiment.”
For the purpose above referred to, Dr. Demnitz of the Behring Works would contact Dr. Mrugowsky. The minutes of the meeting were prepared by Bieber, under date 4 January 1942.
A copy of the minutes of the meeting last referred to was forwarded to the Army Medical Inspectorate at Berlin. It thus appears that a representative of Handloser’s office, Scholz, attended the meeting, and that a copy of the minutes was forwarded to the Army Medical Inspectorate.
There is also evidence that on the same day a conference was held between the defendant Handloser, Conti of the Ministry of Interior, Reiter of the Health Department of the Reich, Gildemeister of the Robert Koch Institute, and the defendant Mrugowsky, at which time it was decided to establish a research station at Buchenwald concentration camp to test the efficacy of the egg-yolk, and other vaccines on concentration camp inmates. As a result of the conference an experimental station was established at Buchenwald under the direction of Dr. Ding, with the defendant Hoven acting as his deputy.