Launch Event and Symposium: The Lancet Commission on Medicine, Nazism, and the Holocaust: historical evidence, implications for today, teaching for tomorrow

The Nazi era arguably provides the best-documented historical examples of medical involvement in transgressions and crimes against vulnerable individuals and groups. Health professionals played an important role in formulating, supporting, and implementing the Nazi regime’s programme of eugenics and ‘racial hygiene.’

This included participation in forced sterilizations, coerced and often deadly human experiments, the ‘euthanasia’ killing programmes, medicalized killings in concentration camps, and selecting prisoners for murder in the extermination camps of the Holocaust. What happened in Europe during the Second World War has wide-ranging ramifications for medical professionals to this day. Confronting what happened in medicine in this period is crucial to inform the ethical practice of health care and to understand potential dangers in medicine today.

With this report, the commission aims to provide a reliable, up-to-date historical documentation and a thorough analysis of the implications. Teaching of this subject should be part of health professional curricula around the world, helping to promote ethical conduct, moral development, courage to stand up against antisemitism, racism, and other forms of discrimination, and the formation of a history-informed professional identity based on compassion.

• Download the report on The Lancet

 

Moderation: Christiane Druml, Director, Ethics, Collections and History of Medicine, Medical University of Vienna

• Greetigs
  Markus Müller
  Rector, Medical University of Vienna
  
  Miriam Sabin
  North American Executive Editor The Lancet
  
  Richard Horton
  Editor-in-Chief, The Lancet
   
• Presentation of Report
  Herwig Czech
  Ethics, Collections and History of Medicine, Medical University of Vienna
  
  Sabine Hildebrandt
  Boston Children’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, USA
  
  Shmuel Pinchas Reis
  Center for Medical Education, Hadassah/Hebrew University Faculty of Medicine, Department of Digital Medical Technologies, Holon Institute of Technology, Holon, Israel
  
  Shani Levany
  Ben Gurion University of the Negev, Israel
   
• The Meaning of the Report for Survivors of Nazi Medical Experiments
  Video testimonials by Lea Huber and Judith Barnea
  Survivors of Josef Mengele’s twin experiments in Auschwitz
   
• Keynote Implications: Counteracting Inhumanity with Humanity – A Perspective of Confucian Global Ethics about the Lancet Report on Nazi Medicine
  
  Jing-Bao Nie
  Bioethics Centre, Dunedin School of Medicine
  University of Otago, New Zealand
   
• Closing Remarks
  Miriam Sabin
  North American Executive Editor, The Lancet
   
• Coffee Break

• Chair and Welcome
  
  Herwig Czech
  Ethics, Collections, and History of Medicine, Medical University of Vienna, Austria
   
• Keynote History: Understanding the Enormity of the Holocaust –
  The Perspective of Medicine
  
  Dan Michman
  The International Institute for Holocaust Research Yad Vashem, Professor (emeritus), Bar Ilan University, Israel
   
• Panel 1
  Historical Evidence
  
  Volker Roelcke
  Institute for the History, Theory and Ethics of Medicine,
  Giessen University, Germany
  
  Respondent:
  Natalia Aleksiun
  Bud Shorstein Center for Jewish Studies,
  University of Florida, Gainesville, USA
   
• Coffee Break
   
• Panel 2
  Aftermath and Implications for Today
  Chair: Sabine Hildebrandt, Boston Children’s Hospital, Harvard
  Medical School, Boston, USA
  
  Matthew Wynia
  Center for Bioethics and Humanities,
  University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus, USA
  
  Respondent:
  Petra Fuchs
  Heilpädagogik/Inclusion Studies,
  University of Applied Sciences Zittau/Görlitz, Germany
   
• Panel 3
  Teaching for Tomorrow
  Chair: Shmuel Pinchas Reis, Center for Medical Education,
  Hadassah/Hebrew University Faculty of Medicine, Department of Digital
  Medical Technologies, Holon Institute of Technology, Holon, Israel
  
  Hedy S. Wald
  Clinical Professor of Family Medicine,Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University, USA
  
  Respondent:
  Emma Nalianya
  General Practitioner, Eldoret, Kenya.
  Member of the Commission’s Student Advisory Council
   
• Keynote Education: Learning from the Past – Educating for a Better Future
  
  Yvonne Steinert
  Richard and Sylvia Cruess Chair in Medical Education, Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences McGill University, Canada
   
• Closing Remarks
  Herwig Czech, Ethics, Collections, and History of Medicine, Medical University of Vienna, Austria

• Prof. Natalia Aleksiun, Harry Rich Professor of Holocaust Studies at the University of Florida, Gainesville, USA
• Prof. Herwig Czech, Ethics, Collections, and History of Medicine, Medical University of Vienna, Austria
• Dr. Christiane Druml, Director, Josephinum
• Prof. Petra Fuchs, Heilpädagogik/Inclusion Studies, University of Applied Sciences Zittau/Görlitz, Germany
• Dr. Sabine Hildebrandt, Boston Children’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, USA
• Prof. Richard Horton, Editor-in-Chief, The Lancet
• Prof. Dan Michman, Head, The International Institute for Holocaust Research, Yad Vashem Professor (emeritus), Bar Ilan University
• Prof. Markus Müller, Rector, Medical University of Vienna
• Prof. Jing-Bao Nie, Professor of Bioethics, Bioethics Centre, Dunedin School of Medicine, University of Otago, New Zealand
• Dr. Emma Nalianya, General Practictioner, Kenyatta University Teaching, Referral and Research Hospital, Kenya. Member of the Commission’s Student Advisory Council
• Prof. Shmuel Pinchas Reis, Center for Medical Education, Hadassah/Hebrew University Faculty of Medicine, Department of Digital Medical Technologies, Holon Institute of Technology, Holon, Israel

• Prof. Volker Roelcke, Head, Institute for the History, Theory and Ethics of Medicine, Giessen University, Germany

• Dr. Miriam Lewis Sabin, North American Executive Editor, The Lancet

• Prof. Yvonne Steinert, Professor of Family Medicine and Health Sciences Education, Richard and Sylvia Cruess Chair in Medical Education, Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, McGill University

• Prof. Hedy Wald, Clinical Professor of Family Medicine, Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University, USA

• Prof. Matthew Wynia, Head, Center for Bioethics and Humanities, University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus, USA