NAZI SCIENCE - THE DACHAU HYPOTHERMIA EXPERIMENTS

IT is widely recognized that the experiments performed on prisoners in German concentration camps during the Second World War were in fact brutal crimes committed under the guise of medical research. There is controversy, however, about the use of the results obtained from those studies. Among the approximately 30 known projects, the controversy has focused most intensely on the experiments involving hypothermia in humans that were performed at the Dachau concentration camp.1 The debate among scientists and ethicists has spread to the public through the print and broadcast media.2 3 4 5 6 Positions range from a total ban to advocacy of the uninhibited… © 1990, Massachusetts Medical Society. All rights reserved.