Biological Warfare of a Different Type.
Manage episode 428352243 series 2812562
Link to Eugene Lazowskis writing:
https://dokumen.pub/private-war-memoirs-of-a-doctor-solder-1933-1944.html
One of the big killers in war throughout history and pre-1940’s was not what you might expect. It was not the ever-increasing genius and lethality of the weapons of the enemy. It was disease.
1939 Dr Eugene Lazowski, a polish physician, had just finished medical school, and was a Lieutenant in his country’s military. The Germans had just conquered Poland with their Blitzkrieg invasion, and he was captured and placed in a POW camp. From which he promptly escaped.
Simultaneously, Typhus was taking the lives of 750 people every day in Poland. The red cross was doing everything they could to help the victims and refugees of war. Dr Lazowski, now 26 years old, was hiding in plain sight working with the red cross in Rozwadow. Having escaped there with his little family, they were doing their best to help others and to survive themselves.
The Jewish ghettos were well established, and though the need was great, the Nazi’s would not allow the Jews to receive medical care from outside the ghetto’s. Typhus was a common killer – along with many other diseases.
If there was a breakout of typhus amongst Jews, the Nazis would shoot them on the spot, leave them lay, and then the home and belongings were burned. Conversely, there was no quick execution for the non-Jewish Poles. They were quarantined – until the disease ran its course, and they either survived or they didn’t.
Noticing this difference in the Nazi’s treatment of victims of Typhus, Dr Lazowski and a college from school, Dr. Matulewicz, realized they might have an opportunity. And, maybe, they might save some lives.
Lazowski and Matulewicz had learned a little secret. One that was not well known in the medical community as a whole. They had found that by injecting individuals with a dead strain of typhus, they would then test positive for the disease. Though quite risky to attempt, they chose to use this knowledge to their advantage.
Suddenly, 12 villages in the area were taken by the scourge of typhus (wink, wink), and one household or another had to be quarantined.
https://www.lowellmilkencenter.org/programs/projects/view/the-weapon-of-intelligence/hero
https://www.timesofisrael.com/how-a-faked-typhus-outbreak-spared-8000-poles-from-the-nazis/
NOTE: Eugene Lazowski story has been portrayed and promoted as a one about saving 8,000 Jews during the second world war. An article by Barbara Necek disputes this. Her research found that the story is true in that about 8000 people were saved, but there is no direct evidence that any of these were Jewish.
https://k-larevue.com/en/investigation-on-a-fake-polish-just/
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