HEALTH UNDER HITLER’S REGIME

Waikato Times, Volume 126, Issue 21035, 10 February 1940, Page 11 (Supplement)

HEALTH UNDER HITLER’S REGIME

Claims Disproved :: National Breakdown :•* Limit Reached

(Dr. Martin Gumpert, formerly head of Berlin City Dispensary)

NAZI PROPAGANDA machine proclaims triumphantly that the supreme achievement of the new order is the sparkling health of the German people. Almost all outsiders accept this statement. Constantly one hears the argument : “But when all is said and done, Hitler did transform a sick and degenerating people into a healthy and vigorous nation.” Did he ? I recently examined the scientific literature of Nazi Germany, on the chance that the traditional thoroughness of German scholars and their propensity for print were stronger than the Nazi censorship. The result was staggering. Here, embedded among the monstrosities of “Aryan” science, were statistical statements and research results whose damaging character had obviously slipped by the Ministry of Propaganda. I soon collected a wide range of statistics, all provided by Nazi authorities and by the doctors and scientists of the Reich. Even Germans living under Nazi censorship can check up on the authenticity of these reports, for they are taken exclusively from publications which are not forbidden. These facts uncover the tragedy of a Nation VV’hich Is Breaking Down Physically. Everywhere in Germany, in the films, in illustrated magazines, in the mass spectacles of party conferences, youth occupies the foreground. Nazi propaganda tries to create the impression that this is the new spirit of the new Germany—happy, healthy, enthusiastic children of the Nordic super-race. What does this youth look like to the doctor ? The whole range of children’s infectious diseases, such as scarlet fever, spinal meningitis and infantile paralysis, has increased sharply. Scarlet fever cases in 1933 were 79,830; in 1937, 117.544. In 1933 there were 77,340 cases of diphtheria; in 1937, 146,733. The diphtheria mortality rate is now more than four times that in the United States. Yet Germany, whose scientists gave diphtheria antitoxin injections to the world, once had one of the lowest mortality rates. Rickets, a vitamin-deficiency disease, is disappearing in most, countries, as a result of proper care and nutrition. But in Germany rickets shows an appalling increase. In Dortmund, 55 per cent, of the children are stricken; in Munich only 3.5 per cent, of the school children are free from its symptoms. These children belong to the political youth organisations. from their sixth year on. Here the premature exertions of the long marches and military exercises undermine the growing organisms and contribute to the bone deformities which begin with rickets. Of his “Experiences in the Health Roll Call of the Hitler Youth, 1938,” Dr. Maerz writes : “The registration of foot deformities surpassed to an astonishing extent our uneasy expectations. More than 70 per cent, of the youth of both sexes had splayed, twisted or flat feet. The frightful extent to which foot deformities interfere with the labour and military capacity of our people is known to every doctor.” But the marching rhythm continues mercilessly. At 18 the young men graduate from the Hitlerjugend into the Labour Service, where they must give a minimum of six months of work. We read the following disheartening item ; “The Labour Service reported that 90 per cent, of its men suffered from fallen arches and flat feet. The health department of the city of Kiel, examining youth born between 1912 and 1917, found that only 12.6 per cent, had no defects. These figures shed more light than any number of words on the unsatisfactory physical condition of the youth groups.” How about the health of the young people in universities, who probably have a better-than-average economic background ? Here is a report published in a medical journal in 1939 : “A review of medical reports of the last four years indicates a marked physical deterioration of material. In the last year the increase oi those with heart complaints has been most alarming. The same may be said of proved cases of heart failure and damaged heart muscles. The number of students not in condition to meet the sports schedule has doubled in the last two years. In 1935 the number of those unable to meet the standard of physical work requirements was below 20 per cent., while today it is almost 50 per cent.” Young factory workers are in even worse condition than the admittedly undernourished students : “Sports contests between older students and the working youth lead to the unavoidable conclusion that the physical working capacity of the students is essentially superior. The athletic performance of young workers is nothing short of appalling; scarcely 20 per cent, come up to normal.” We can only explain this decay of youthful working power by the fact that Nazi Policy Demands Over-exertion on the part of undeveloped youth, premature exhaustion at the stage of earliest growth. The Nazi regime has broken down the laws forbidding child labour. Children may now work in the home from the age of 10 onward—the limit used to be 12—and there has been an enormous increase in work done in the home. In 1937, the number of persons thus engaged rose within six months from 407,488 to 448,613. School attendance is compulsory to the age of 14; but the Nazis evade that provision by allowing apprentice employment at 13 if the child continues to go to school. Workers under 16 are now permitted in steel mills and glass works. The percentage of Ruhr mine workers between the ages of 14 and 20 rose from 8.55 in 1932 to 17.78 in 1937. Even mature workers find the Nazi pace too swift. Food and clothing, safeguards of a people’s health, have declined in quality and risen in price while wages have remained stationary. As a result, cases of sickness recorded in the Sickness Insurance Bureaux rose 20.3 per cent, between 1933 and 1936. The Bureau of Statistics states : “Cases of incapacitation for work have increased to such an extent that 700.000 workers are constantly out of action.” Apparently Dr. Robert Ley, leader of the Labour Front, accomplished little by issuing his ultimatum : “It is everyone’s duty to keep healthy.” There is a striking increase in the number of industrial accidents, which rose, according to the Accident Insurance Bureau, to 1.789,000 in 1937—an increase of 435.000 in two years. These results may be explained by the increased tempo of work, the inadequacy of protective devices, and the employment of untrained workers. We must also take note of what has happened to women in the Third Reich. At first the Nazi slogan was that woman must withdraw from the ranks of labour and return to the home; today she must undertake the heaviest forms of men’s work. On the health of its women depends the future of the nation; and every doctor knows that tho generative organs of women suffer as the result of industrial employment. A representative of the Woman’s Section of the Labour Front observes : “Bringing married women and mothers into industrial labour is an increasing national danger.” It is no surprise to find that tuberculosis is on the increase, in contrast to other civilised countries. All the unfavourable social factors which spread tuberculosis are to be found: the extension of youthful labour, lengthened working hours, decline in real wages, limitation on the free choice of foods. There are in Germany at present 1.500.000 cases of tubercular infection, of which 400.000 are in the lesion stage. These enormous masses of human beings are badly needed in industry, and accordingly a plan has been evolved for exploiting the working powers of the tubercular. This has nothing to do with work therapy, which

slowly and cautiously reconditions the sick organism. “Useful work should be given to tuberculars, not as something to occupy themselves with voluntarily, but as systematic and prescribed labour.” What the process of selection will be we learn from this terrifying statement : “In the first place, open lung tuberculosis must always be regarded as consistent with working capacity.” The Nazis fight tuberculosis in their own way. The District Medical Organisation of Hannover, in February, 1939, explained the system thus; “It is necessary to harness the labour power of the tubercular by appropriate integration with the Labour Front. The basic principles for the totalitarian combating of tuberculosis are maintaining the working capacity of the tubercular and ruthless elimination of all anti-social tuberculars.” This will remain a Classic Document Of Nazi Science. Since the tuberculars’ working power is needed, they must be driven to compulsory labour by political organisations, and if they behave “anti-socially”—perhaps they will actually cough—they must be “ruthlessly eliminated.” In Hitler’s Germany there has been a disturbing rise in diseases caused by bad food ; dysentery, ptomaine poisoning, typhoid and paratyphoid. Dysentery is a typical filth disease which can be avoided by hygienic regulation of food transportation and handling; yet it has increased 300 per cent, under Hitler. This is partly because of the free distribution of the meat of inferior cattle. Moreover, the gigantic stores of food for war use are released to the market when there is danger that they may spoil. From every section come increasing complaints against the deteriorating quality of food, only a part of which is really fit for consumption. There is not today in Germany a definite state of hunger, as in the days of the World War blockade. But there is the much more treacherous state of continuous and chronic undernourishment. Since 1933 there has been a considerable decrease in the consumption of important foods like meat, fats, eggs and potatoes. Even more important are certain imponderables which cannot be expressed statistically: lowered food quality and the falsification of food values by the use of substitutes. Yeast is prepared from wood, coffee from oats; fish protein is used for baking, mineral oils for cooking, baked and conserved fruit replace fresh fruits and vegetables. The lack of fresh vegetables is especially marked. The consumption of vegetables among American workers is twice as high as among German workers. More than 1,482.000 acres of valuable land have been withdrawn from productivity for the construction of barracks, airdromes and enclosures for military exercises. This land, lost to the food resources of the people, exceeds in area all the truck gardens of the German Reich. Tables recently published by the Labour Front show that the average German consumed 2413 calories per day in 1037. Before the World War a German worker of less-than-average income consumed 3385 calories. There is a sharp shortage in the most important foodstuff, albumen, and in carbohydrates. Here is what the Director of the Hygienic Institute of Marburg University has to say : “The premature collapse of working capacity and the early invalidism which are unfortunately observable among so many Germans are conditioned, to the extent of 60 per cent., by malnutrition.” Hitler does not drink, and one might think that the Fuehrer’s abstinence would lead to a diminution in the manufacture of alcohol and thus produce beneficial results for the national health. But alcohol is the Nazi Opium For Germany. Hence there has been a tremendous increase in beer drinking, from 889,000,000 gallons in 1932 to 1,242.000,000 gallons in 1938. The increase is wholly in highly alcoholic beer; weak beer production has diminished. Consumption of whisky and wine has doubled. “This,” says Dr. J. Flaig. “means an enormous use of food and fodder for the production of alcoholic drink, at a time when we are still far from independent in the matter of food.” The Third Reich has achieved the mournful distinction of heading the international tables of suicide statistics, a supplementary barometer of health. In Germany 4.1 of every 10.000 take their own lives, while in America the figure is 1.4. The number of suicides in Germany today almost equals the total for the rest of Europe—even though the German official figure represents only part of the true number. On the whole, after six years of “health-giving” Nazi rule, the general mortality rate has risen considerably. Some 80,000 more persons die annually in the new Germany than in the old. This fact is the moie striking because for the last 14 years every other country in the world, except Colombia, Egypt and Greece, shows a decline in the mortality rate. The German death rate has increased for nearly every age group, but particularly for the levels of one to 15 years and 20 to 45. Every form of compulsion at the command of the State has been mobilised to increase marriage and propagation. Yet marriages receded from 12.2 per thousand in 1934 to 8.9 per thousand in 1937, and the present birth rate is 9.5 per thousand lower than is needed to keep the population at its present level. German mothers are on strike; no other conclusion can be drawn from a comparison of the 1937 German-Austrian birth rate of 18.3 per thousand with the rates of neighbouring countries : Holland, 19.8; Yugoslavia, 29.7; Rumania, 30.8. What is being done to stop the decay in the health of the German people ? Is the education of the rising generation of doctors being improved ? On the contrary. Two laws passed in 1939 are significant. One cut down the period of medical study by two years. The other legalised the activities of quacks and nature healers : “Those who feel within themselves a special call to nature healing can dispense with higher education or any form of examination.” For every four certified doctors in Germany there is one so-called nature healer. In a “totalitarian” war the issue will be decided by the state of health and the power of resistance of the peoples involved. Germany is today in the condition of a nation which has been carrying on an exhausting war for more than six years. How can the German youth, whose power of performance has been enfeebled, how can the German people, Undernourished And Beset With Sickness, stand up for long to the assault of a still unexhausted enemy ? Recently the Nazi publication Monatshefte fur Sozialpolitik dared to ask : “What good does it do us to enlarge our military equipment if the physical capacity of our people is being so reduced that we may run short of fit recruits?” The rapid increase in the physical defects of potential soldiers is astounding. Even in 1935 and 1936, only 75 per cent, of the men called up were found fit for active service. By 1938 only 55 per cent, were acceptable. The relevant English figures reveal a fundamental difference between the overworked German youth and an unexhausted population. Of the first 19.000 men called up under the new British conscription act, 93 per cent, passed and 84.5 per cent, were found perfectly fit for the heaviest military duties. This survey of German health conditions, taken from Nazi publications open to everyone, demonstrates that the power-radiating healthfulness of the Third Reich is a propaganda lie. The Nazis have produced not health, but sickness. The German people have reached the limit of their physical and psychic working capacity. If no relief comes, Germany faces the prospect of a collapse much more dreadful than that of 1918.