...three ho shoed symptoms of mental retardation, physical deformity, or other symptoms included on a questionnaire from the Reich Health Ministry.A decision on hether to allo the child to live as then made by three medical experts solely on the basis of the questionnaire, ithout any examination and ithout reading any medical records. Each expert placed a mark in red pencil or - mark in blue pencil under the term treatment on a special form. A red plus mark meant a decision to kill the child. A blue minus sign meant meant a decision against killing. Three plus symbols resulted in a euthanasia arrant being issued and the transfer of the child to a Childrens Specialty Department for death by injection or gradual starvation. The decision had to be unanimous. In cases here the decision as not unanimous the child as kept under observation and another attempt ould be made to get a unanimous decision. The Nazi euthanasia program quickly expanded to include older disabled children and adults. Hitlers decree of October, 1939, typed on his personal stationery and back dated to Sept. 1, enlarged the authority of certain physicians to be designated by name in such manner that persons ho, according to human judgment, are incurable can, upon a most careful diagnosis of their condition of sickness, be accorded a mercy death. Questionnaires ere then distributed to mental institutions, hospitals and other institutions caring for the chronically ill. Patients had to be reported if they suffered from schizophrenia, epilepsy, senile disorders, therapy resistant paralysis and syphilitic diseases, retardation, encephalitis, Huntingtons chorea and other neurological conditions, also those ho had been continuously in institutions for at least 5 years, or ere criminally insane, or did not posses German citizenship or ere not of German or related blood, including Jes, Negroes, and Gypsies. A total of six killing centers ere established including the ell knon psychiatric clinic at Hadamar. The euthanasia program as eventually headed by an SS man named Christian irth, a notorious brute ith the nickname the savage Christian. At Brandenburg, a former prison as converted into a killing center here the first Nazi experimental gassings took place. The gas chambers ere disguised as shoer rooms, but ere actually hermetically sealed chambers connected by pipes to cylinders of carbon monoxide. Patients ere generally drugged before being led naked into the gas chamber. Each killing center included a crematorium here the bodies ere taken for disposal. Families ere then falsely told the cause of death as medical such as heart failure or pneumonia. But the huge increase in the death rate for the disabled combined ith the very obvious plumes of odorous smoke over the killing centers aroused suspicion and fear. At Hadamar, for example, local children even taunted arriving busloads of patients by saying here comes some more to be gassed. On August 3, 1941, a Catholic Bishop, Clemens von Galen, delivered a sermon in Mnster Cathedral attacking the Nazi euthanasia program calling it plain murder. The sermon sent a shockave through the Nazi leadership by publicly condemning the program and urged German Catholics to ithdra ourselves and our faithful from their Nazi influence so that e may not be contaminated by their thinking and their ungodly behavior. As a result, on August 23, Hitler suspended Aktion T4, hich had accounted for nearly a hundred thousand deaths by this time. The Nazis retaliated against the Bishop by beheading three parish priests ho had distributed his sermon, but left the Bishop unharmed to avoid making him into a martyr. Hoever, the Nazi euthanasia program quietly continued, but ithout the idespread gassings. Drugs and starvation ere used instead and doctors ere encouraged to decide in favor of death henever euthanasia as being considered. The use of gas chambers at the euthanasia killing centers ultimately served as training centers for the SS. They used the technical knoledge and experience gained during the euthanasia program to construct huge killing centers at Auschitz, Treblinka and other concentration camps in an attempt to exterminate the entire Jeish population of Europe. SS personnel from the euthanasia killing centers, notably irth, Franz Reichleitner and Franz Stangl later commanded extermination camps.Statistics of orld ar IIIncluding the European and Pacific TheatersCountriesTotal Deaths of Prear PopulationMilitary Deaths Civilian DeathsUSSR20,600,00010.413,600,0007,000,000CHINA10
,000,0002.0GERMANY6,850,0009.53,250,0003,600,000POL
AND6,123,00017.2123,0006,000,000JAPAN2,000,0002.7YU
GOSLAVIA1,706,00010.9FRANCE810,0001.9340,000470,000
GREECE520,0007.2UNITED STATES500,0000.4500,000AUSTRIA480,0007.2ROMANIA460
,0003.4HUNGARY420,0003.0ITALY410,0000.9330,00080,00
0CZECHOSLOVAKIA400,0002.7GREAT BRITAIN388,0000.8326,00062,000NETHERLANDS210,0002.
4198,00012,000BELGIUM88,0001.176,00012,000FINLAND84
,0002.2AUSTRALIA39,0000.3CANADA34,0000.3ALBANIA28,0
002.5INDIA24,0000.01NORAY10,2620.3NE ZEALAND10,0000.6LUXEMBOURG5,0001.7TOTAL52,199,262J
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