Doctor for Whom Asperger Syndrome Named Helped Nazis Kill Children
Tamar Lapin reports at the NYPost:
The Austrian doctor for whom Asperger syndrome is named helped the Nazis kill disabled children during World War II, according to a study published Thursday.
Hans Asperger, a pediatrician who first identified the syndrome in 1944, made good with the Nazis by referring children to one of their notorious euthanasia clinics, Medical University of Vienna medical historian Herwig Czech revealed in the journal Molecular Autism.
Nearly 800 children who didn't fit into the Third Reich's criteria of "worthy to live" -- meaning they lacked "racial purity" and "hereditary worthiness" -- died at the Am Spiegelgrund clinic in Vienna between 1940 and 1945. . . .
"The children, who had physical or psychological 'defects,' were deemed undesirable and were killed through starvation and lethal injection -- though their cause of death was reported as pneumonia," Lapin continues.
"While Asperger touted himself as having shielded his patients from the Nazi regime, he was a cog in its killing machine and was rewarded for his loyalty with career opportunities, Czech found," according to Lapin.
Asperger "was responsible for depriving of their liberty many children whom he deemed incapable of existing outside institutions," Lapin reports.
Read more.
