Overdramatization of the burdens on health and social services: a continuing debate in the history of German medicine.

Abstract

Departing from the latest academic research into Nazi medicine in Germany, the author looks at theoretical and ideological concepts in German history that left their mark on the formation of race hygiene. He argues that the overdramatization of the economic burden caused by the special requirements of the chronically ill and handicapped runs through all epochs of modern medical history and that this culturally pessimistic way of looking at a serious social problem in Germany reveals a frightening tradition which reached its cruelest climax in the so-called T4 operation of the Nazis. The author makes a plea for this dark chapter of German medical history to be carefully analyzed and for the results of this research to be used in the current discussion on the further development of the health system, particularly in regard to patients who require special care.