22 Friday, September 29, 1978

THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS

Warsaw Ghetto Doctors Sought to Aid Jews

Gage

Oldsmobile inc.

By BEN GALLOB

(Copyright 1978, JTA, Inc.)

May The Coming

NEW YEAR

Be Filled With

Health, Peace and Prosperity

For All

21710 Woodward ( 6 blks N. of 8 Mile)

399-3200

A medical symposium on
semi-starvation held at the
YIVO Institute for Jewish
Research in Manhattan on
the theme, "Remembering
the Doctors of the Warsaw
Ghetto," heard a series of
reports on the little known
use by the Nazis of starva-
tion and disease in their
campaign of genocide
against European Jewry.
According to papers pre-
sented at the symposium, a
number of Jewish doctors,
:many of whom might have
escaped the Nazi death

5 lbs. of MATZO

If I can't Beat Your Best Deal

/

Margolis Household Furniture

ARNOLD MARGOLIS

D Es
! PI CE
T OR
E w
R I IS R

Extends Heartiest and Best Wishes
For A

HAPPY & HEALTHY NEW YEAR

1Zialzri rizue n:v5

Arnold and Sally Margolis and Family

13703 W. McNichols 342-5351 Hrs. Mon thru Sat. 9:30 til 5:30

A HAPPY AND HEALTHY NEW YEAR

machine, chose to remain
with semi-starvation dur- outside the ghetto, at the
with the trapped Warsaw ing pregnancy, in children, risk of death. Practical work
Jews, to give the starving,
and in adults, were directed began in February 1942.
disease-wracked Jews such
at members of the medical Monthly sessions were held
medical help as they could.
profession.
to discuss the observations
They also took advantage of
Laub stressed the self- of the doctors, Dr. Gumpert
an unparalleled opportu-
sacrifice and dedication of reported. Two age groups —
nity to observe the
the ghetto doctors during one of six-12 years and one
pathological effects of star-.
the Holocaust, declaring of 20 to 40 years — were de-
vation.
that, despite inhuman odds cided on, to exclude from the
The symposium last May,
and nightmarish circum- study the biochemical im-
also held at the Columbia
stances, the doctors re- balances of infancy, adoles-
University College of . mained true to themselves, cence and advancing age.
Physicians and Surgeons,
to their profession and to
Each of the doctors knew
was sponsored by the Joint
the Jewish people.
his work could be inter-
Distribution Committee,
Weinberg described rupted suddenly by death —
the Institute of Human
the work done by JDC his or his patients, or 133'
Nutrition of the College of staff members in the mass catastrophe. But the
Physicians and Surgeons,
ghetto, asserting that doctors worked feverishly,
the New York Academy of
many who could have left and in the months left to
Medicine and YIVO.
Poland refused to do so them, they collected a quan-
Many of the main
and many were killed as a tity of observations and
points of the papers pre-
result of that decision.
data which would have re-
sented at the two-day
Dr. Trunk reported that quired years under normal
symposium were sum-
the use of bacteria was an circumstances.
marized in an article by
integral part of the Nazi
As the situation grew
Dr. Martin Gumpert, a
genocide campaign. He re- desperate, it became
geriatrics specialist, pub-
ported that the Nazis clear that the manuscript
lished in "The American
created conditions in the on the findings had to be
Scholar," issued by Phi
ghetto which guaranteed removed from the ghetto.,
Beta Kappa.
disease and epidemics Arrangements were
Reports were presented at
among its residents. By this made to deliver it to
the symposium by Maurice means, he said, the Ger- Witold Orlowski, profes-
Laub, YIVO chairman;
mans achieved two objec- sor of internal medicine '-
Marshall M. Weinberg, co-
tives: isolating the ghetto at Warsaw University,
treasurer of JDC and through strict quarantine according to Dr. Gum-
chairman of the JDC East-
and the decimation of its pert. Dr. Gumpert re-
ern Europe area committee; population.
ported that none of the 22
Dr. Isaiah. Trunk, historian
Dr. Gumpert's account collaborating doctors
and chief archivist at YIVO; traced the start of the ghetto survived. The only one
Dr. Alexander Hertz,
by the German occupation still alive after the War-
sociologist; and Dr. Myron
forces on Oct. 16, 1940, saw Ghetto uprising, Dr.
Winick, professor of nutri-
when all "Aryans" were Emil Apfelbaum, died in
tion at Columbia Univer- evacuated and eight-feet January 1946, as a result
sity. Sessions and lectures
high brick walls, topped of his wartime suffering.
on the second day, dealing with broken glass, were
Dr. Gumpert, reporting
erected to seal off the he saw the study document
ghetto.
two or three years ago, said
There was one closely it was carefully written in
watched gate, through longhand in Yiddish. A
which bread made from friend translated parts of it
wormy flour, mixed with for Dr. Gumpert from time
plaster and sawdust, and to time, he said. He added
rotten potatoes, were deliv- the papers recently were
ered weekly to the totally translated into French and
isolated 500,000 men, published by the JDC under
women and children. At the the title, "Maladie de
end of the first year of such Famine," in Warsaw.
ghetto life, all food reserves
He said there is no dicus-
were exhausted and the sion of politics in the 262
daily ration for each indi- pages "and no note of self
vidual fell to about 800 pity." He called "almost in-
calories, compared with credulous" the scientific de-
3,000 calories plus daily for tachment of the doctors
the average American to- from their own fate and
day.
from the "infernal back-
After'six months of de- ground and surroundings."
portations, the ghetto who avariciously guards
population had plum- what is left to him, that is,
meted from 500,000 to his last physical resources."
Dr. Gumpert reported
40,000, Dr. Gumpert re-
ported, and the Jews that the scientific studies by
secretly mobilized. Gum- the ghetto doctors, which
pert then described the proceeded through the first
incredible 42-day battle period, starvation, were in-
when a handful of terrupted by the second
badly-armed, underfed period — extermination.
and unaided Jews stood Their laboratories were
off the superbly-trained smashed, their hospitals,
and massively-equipped such as they were, were
burned and the subjects Of-.
German forces.
Dr. Gumpert reported their study — Jews — were
that Dr. Israel Milejkowski, "destroyed wholesale."
But the work went on and
health commissioner of the
district, organized a com- up to the end, there was a
mittee which set up special' little group of doctors meet-
wards for adults and chil- ing in a basement near the
dren and rebuilt as best ghetto cemetery, "discuss-
they could the laboratories ing, writing, editing, cor-
destroyed by the 1939 Ger- relating their facts and
man invasion. Under his their conclusions, until they
supervision, a group of themselves died of the
ghetto doctors organized a symptoms they so accu-
cooperative research project raLely described, or were led
to study the effects of star- away to slaughter or
vation on the human body, perished in the fighting,"
leaving to the world "an
their own included.
abiding testament to
Essential instruments human self-respect and
had to be smuggled in from dignity."