Euthanasia Programs of Nazi Germany Essay

Hutchinson proposed that voluntary ¬euthanasia could grow to the deaths of more than 1000 terminally ill patients a year before 2030. The Andrews government had the country's first assisted death in September 2017. The self-¬administered death is open to terminally ill patients aged over 18. The suffering must be with an ¬incurable disease with a life ¬expectancy of less than 12 months. I will use this to demonstrate the growing number of physician assisted suicides.

The chapter on Nazi medical experiments in Chalmers’ book is one of the most fascinating chapters because it examines the different types of techniques that the Nazi’s used to sterilize men and women. Chalmers explains that women were particularly subject to medical experiments because the Nazis were obsessed with destroying inferior races and wanted to perfect the art of sterilization so no more undesirable elements would be born (Ibid 123). However, both men and women were subject to Nazi medical experiments like medical injections, X-Rays, and chemicals, which resulted in burnt skin, abnormalities, and death. Among these experimentations many chemical companies, doctors, and University professors supported the experiments being done on

Perret, Françoise. "The Nazi Doctors and the Nuremberg Code George J. Annas and Michael A. Grodin, The Nazi Doctors and the Nuremberg Code — Human Rights in Human Experimentation, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1992, 371 Pp. plus Lists, a Diagram and Photographs." International Review of the Red Cross 35.305 (1995): 227-28. Web.

Operation T-4 was the killing by the Germans of the defenseless, the handicapped and mentally disabled. The Nazis believed that these men and women were a burden to society and exhibited the classification of “Life unworthy of life”, so they therefore began exterminating them from existence. The Nazis viewed them as a waste of time and money and began what would eventually become the largest genocide in history. Operation T-4 originated and obtained its name within a hospital located on #4 Terrian Strasse street, the hospital in which all of the handicapped and disabled patients were being held. To commence the ridding of these “worthless bothers”, the killing began with medical professionals injecting serum into the patient and ultimately

At the beginning of the fall of 1939, Nazi officials selected around 70,000 Germans institutionalized for mental illness or disabilities to be gassed to death in the so-called Euthanasia program. After prominent German religious leader protest, Hitler put an end to the program in August 1941. By the spring of 1945, German leadership was dissolving amid internal dissent, with Goering and Himmler both Hitler and take power.

During World War II Nazi Doctors played a key role in the mass genocide of millions of Jews, Gypsies, and those who were mentally and physically handicapped. The primary motivations of the Nazi doctors were most likely provoked by fear and safety at the cost of the cleansing the Aryan race of those who were considered impure. Motivations including peer-pressure and self-preservation are very likely to have increased the ability for the Nazi doctors to ignore one of the most basic components of moral and ethical code (do not kill others), as well as being able to ignore the Hippocratic oath all doctors swear by, to experiment on the poor dying bodies of the victims of the Holocaust. In order to murder thousands of Jews, Gypsies, and those who

In 1939, Adolf Hitler Authorized a medical administered program of “mercy death” was the code name for Operation T4. This program gave physicians full control over their patients and they would judged whether their patients were considered “incurable”. Institutions such as schools for the deaf and even teachers of the deaf students would turn in deaf members to the German community, they would then force sterilization and also some would be part of medical experiments. Children that were born with any kind of disability were killed by starvation or even lethal

When the Nazis signed the sterilization law on July 14, 1933, this changed the whole way of life for the disabled. This resulted in the T4

Disabled Germans were killed in gassings. Midwives, physicians, and guardians of children with severe birth defects were supposed to register the defected child while three expert physicians would decide whether the child lived or died, usually not even seeing the child in person. This was all part to create the “master Aryan race.” 5,000 children were killed in the clinics and state hospitals they were brought to once registered. The Nazis wanted to keep the Euthanasia Program (the program Hitler was using to kill these helpless children) a secret, so the Nazis sent the children’s families made up ways of how their child died. In October of 1939, Hitler started Operation T-4, which was where adult men and women who were “incurable” were moved to carbon monoxide chambers and gassed. 70,000 of these innocent people were lost (Final Solutions).

At extermination camps, the Nazis conducted many medical experiments on the prisoners that resulted in many deaths. Between 1939 and 1945 medical research projects involving cruel and often lethal experimentation on human subjects were performed. These projects were supported, well-known organizations in the Third Reich and were categorized into three fields: research intended at cultivating the endurance and rescue of German troops, testing of medical techniques and medications, and experiments that pursued to approve Nazi cultural belief. More than seven thousand victims of these cruel medical experiments have been acknowledged. Targets of the experiments included Jews, Poles, Gypsies, Soviet prisoners of war, homosexuals, and Catholic priests (Medical Experiments ).

During the Holocaust German physicians did countless experiments on prisoners in Auschwitz. They divided the experiments into three categories. The first category was aimed at facilitating the survival of people in the military, physicians conducted high-altitude experiments. The test was done by using using a low-pressure chamber, to determine the maximum altitude from which they could parachute to safety if they were in danger. Other experiments were freezing prisoners and they tried to find a treatment for hypothermia. The second category of experimentation was aimed at developing and treatments for injuries and illnesses. Scientists tested medications to prevent and treat of contagious diseases. The third category of medical experimentation was used to try and treat the racial and ideological tenets of the Nazi worldview. Joseph Mengele conducted medical experiments on twins to compare them. He also did test to determine how different "races" withstood different diseases. The testing was very cruel and was used to be done to try and find an inexpensive way for better

This is why Euthanasia is important and summarizing the research that I found on Euthanasia. Euthanasia is important because there is a lot of arguments about Euthanasia. Some people support it and some people do not support Euthanasia (Euthanasia and assisted suicide- Arguments). Euthanasia allows people to be free from physical pain. It is the hastening of death of a patient to prevent further sufferings (Euthanasia Revisited). The religious argument states God chooses when human life ends. Euthanasia also causes mental suffering because they are in physical pain or they are experiencing with terminal illness. It is a debatable issue. There are many different opinions on Euthanasia.

Humans, like all animals, attempt to evade death. Though death is usually seen as an unwanted end, some see it as an alternative to suffering. Most people cringe at the thought of suicide, but is euthanasia the same thing? Do human beings have the right to choose death?

A teacher I once had in high school would often talk about her father who lived in hospice care. Her father suffered from dementia and had been for years. She would often talk about how on his “good” days he would plead her husband to put a pillow on his head and suffocate him, to take him out of his misery. If it was legal, her husband would have willingly helped her father and put him out of his misery, however in the state of North Carolina, physician-assisted suicide is illegal. Luckily, her father passed away this year and is finally free of pain and suffering. However, if physician-assisted suicide was legal, her father would not have had to suffer as long as he did.

Euthanasia, which is also referred to as mercy killing, is the act of ending someone’s life either passively or actively, usually for the purpose of relieving pain and suffering. “All forms of euthanasia require an intention to accelerate death in order to benefit patients experiencing a poor quality of life” (Sayers, 2005). It is a highly controversial subject that often leaves a person with mixed emotions and beliefs. Opinions regarding this topic hinge on the health and mental state of the victim as well as method of death. It raises legal issues as well as the issue of morals and ethics. Euthanasia is divided into two different categories, passive euthanasia and active euthanasia. “There are unavoidable uncertainties in both active and