1947-06-18, #4: Doctors' Trial (late afternoon)
THE MARSHAL: Persons in the Court room will please find their seats.
The Tribunal is again in session.
THE PUBIDENT: Counsel may proceed.
EUGEN HAAGEN — Resumed
DIRECT EXAMINATION (Continued)
BY DR. TIPP:
Q: Professor, one concluding question in this matter. You said that you intended to carry out vaccinations in Natzweiler Concentration Camp in order be immunize the camp against typhus. You further stated that these intended vaccinations were experiments in so far as they were to test the tolerability of the vaccine, is that so?
A: Yes. That is correct.
Q: Another question — in this document 121 which we discussed last it is said that the first group of inmates that were to be made available to you for vaccination were selected from other camps, and further below you said, that prisoners were sent to you. One could draw the conclusion that these were therefore purely experiments and were not quite in accord to do with the immunizing character of the camp. Perhaps you could make this clear to us.
A: Regarding these first protective vaccinations the same is true as I said before, namely, that I had no place to produce the vaccines, but could only produce small amounts of vaccine there. Those were the reasons why I began vaccinations with 100 persons in Natzweiler. Regarding the choice of the selection of the persons to be vaccinated I said already that I had no immediate influence on that. I could, only do this for purely medical reasons and that is why I when the first prisoners refused, to carry out any vaccinations at all.
Q: Now the fact that the prisoners first to be vaccinated came from other camps is not to be attributed to your influence. If I understand you correctly that was a measure taken by the competent SS office over which you had no influence?
A: Correct. I had no influence over where the persons to be vaccinated came from.
Q: Then you don't know why prisoners from outside were put at your disposal to be vaccinated?
A: — No, I don't.
Q: Now, witness, I turn to the next document on page 80 of document book 12. This is document No. 122, exhibit 298, correction, page 79. It is a letter from Rose to you of 13 December 1943. In this letter the frequently mentioned Copenhagen vaccine is mentioned. Herr Rose writes here that the testing of many vaccines simultaneously gives a clearer picture of better or worse results of a method that the testing of one vaccine alone. Further there is mention of the experiments in Buchenwald. Let me ask you first of all, Professor, what did you know in December 1943 when you received this letter about the Buchenwald experiments?
A: I heard the details about these Buchenwald experiments only from this trial from the documents. Moreover, the report on the part of Dr. Ding at the consulting conference in 1943 must be mentioned and I heard of Professor Rose's protest against these human experiments at that time.
Q: You then had no connection with these Ding experiments?
A: I never worked with Ding and know of his work only from the report at this consulting conference.
Q: The Prosecution has drawn the deduction, regarding these Buchenwald experiments that the efficacy of the vaccine was tested by subsequent infection with pathogenic virus. Will you please say what you have to about that?
A: This attitude on the part of the Prosecution ignores the fact as I said several times, I never had a strain of virus which is pathogenic for human beings, consequently I could not carry out such infection as the Prosecution seems to assume. Such subsequent infection with humanly pathogenic virus I never thought of carrying out because I was working as a scientist with my own material and wasn't testing mixture for other vaccines at all.
As I have already said, on occasion of [illegible], I vaccinated some of the inmates there, with an attenuated virus in order to minimize the reactions to the vaccine. I thought that in the next vaccination that I should carry out these primary vaccinations with dead vaccines and I wanted to use such a vaccine that used a dead virus and I wanted to use a dead vaccine for that. In the meantime between Schirmek vaccines and the new vaccinations in Natzweiler, I had carried my work to the point where I no longer needed a dead vaccine. But the previous history was this; Professor Rose, by sending me this Kopenhagen vaccine thought he was supporting me and giving me assistance. And he suggested that I include this dead vaccine in my series of vaccines. Let me say, regarding this Kopenhagen vaccine that it was a liver vaccine which is said to be much more effective than the other dead vaccines, particularly than the lung vaccine; and it is said to be much more effective, as I have said and from it, in dead form a better protection could be expected. Now, it was my point of view that if we should distribute over 100 persons again and would not get other persons there would not be enough persons vaccinated to be of value for comparisons. So, I didn't see any reason for introducing the Kopenhagen vaccine. I told this to Professor Rose and Professor Rose answered in the form as we have seen in the letter which constitutes this document. This would have given some basis for comparisons between the two vaccines, However, I didn't use it because I was no longer interested in it since in the meantime we had succeeded somewhat in attenuating our own virus that we could do without it, I heard no more from Professor Rose about this vaccine and never received the Kopenhagen vaccine.
Q: Then you say, Professor, that this was a dead vaccine, namely the Kopenhagen vaccine, and there was also your own dead vaccine which was to be used for a preliminary vaccination to reduce the reactions to the living vaccine. However, this plan, although originally intended was never carried out?
A: Yes, that is so.
Q: Now, Professor, we stopped with your letter to Professor Hirt of 15 November, '43, in which you ask him to make other prisoners available. Was this request met later and could you carry out vaccinations in Natzweiler later with your new vaccine?
A: Yes, I received the person I had requested and in December of 1943 and January of 1944, we could carry out these vaccinations. I did these vaccinations in two groups of 40 persons each with my living attenuated virus which is no longer humanly pathogenic, and this I want to state explicitly.
Q: Professor, please describe these vaccinations briefly to the Tribunal.
A: First, a group of 40 persons was vaccinated. The first vaccination was done with one cc. intramuscularly. One was a vaccine made of Murine typhus virus vaccine. In no case did local reactions of fever or other symptoms occur. The second vaccination took place a week later. This was again one cc. of vaccine introduced intramuscularly. This was no longer pathogenic to human beings. To complete the story I have to say that between the Schirmek vaccinations in May and these vaccinations, I had turned to the production of a louse typhus vaccine; and this vaccine contained living virus. Before it was used in Natzweiler as a vaccine, it was tested on ourselves that is with some collaborators, to ascertain the tolerability and effects. We were roughly ten persons, members of the institute and also students. Only then did we use the vaccine with the prisoners in Natzweiler. Four weeks after the last vaccination, there were the usual serological examinations. The Weil-Felix reaction was used. The average titer, let me say, was better than in the vaccinations with the rat virus. It was, namely, 2,000. I need not go into these details. The general reactions were normal reactions to inoculation, fever and headaches; but there were no manifestations of actually typhus as a result of inoculations.
Q: You said that you carried out these vaccinations on the first group through intramuscular injections, if I understood you correctly, but you are speaking of a first group so I assume there must have been a second group. How did you carry out the vaccination of the second group?
A: It occurred to me that instead of injecting the vaccine, the vaccination could be carried out by scarifying the skin in the same way that you scrape the skin when you make a small pox vaccination. Therefore, same as with the first group, with the same living virus vaccine, I vaccinated 40 additional persons with scarification of the skin. Let me point out the experiments on myself and on my assistants were carried out in the same way, with scarification of the skin. The reactions were comparatively mild, corresponding roughly to the reactions to a vascular typhus vaccine reactions so that we had no misgivings about undertaking this kind of fascination.
Q: You described the reactions of yourself and the volunteers as very slight. Now, the reactions of the prisoners were stronger, were they not?
A: Yes, they were stronger again. And then we can only explain that by believing that the general state of health among the prisoners was lower than, among my associates, but there was no such thing as a natural manifestation of typhus or any fatalities.
Q: Professor, this work was done as you saw around December of '43 and January of '44. We have a document from this time which I should like to discuss with you at this time. This is Document No. 138, Exhibit 300. It is in Document Book 12 on Page 81. This is a correspondence between the Reich Research Council and yourself. First of all I am interested in here in your letter to the President of the Reich Research Council of 12 January 1944, Particularly number two which concerns itself with typhus. You refer here to vaccinations that you carried out, and you say, and I quote:
The effects could be tested on 8 persons so far—
What effects are you talking about here?
A: This report to the Reich Research Council refers to vaccinations that I performed in Schirmek, and I am mentioning here the one group of 8 persons of May, 1943 that were vaccinated with murine typhus vaccine. This letter then, was written roughly at the same time as my vaccinations in Natzweiler with the louse vaccine. I was referring to this work when I said that experiments were underway to ascertain whether with an epidemic provazeki similar results could be obtained.
Q: I can assume, Professor, from the contents of this document that the effects you are referring to are the Weil-Felix reactions, is that so?
A: Yes, that is so.
Q: In the last sentence of this, vaccine the concept of the anti-infections effectiveness of the dry vaccine is mentioned; it is to be tested on human beings; we shall return to that concept later. You have already said that there were no fatalities and no manifestations of typhus as a result of these qualifications, is that so?
A: Yes, I can repeat that. There were no manifestations of typhus and there were no fatalities.
Q: But, Professor, to this statement I shall have to put to you something that was said before this Tribunal, and which is quite different from what you have just said. I am referring to the testimony of the witness, Edith Schmidt. On 9 January 1947, on page 1371 of the transcript she said that you had carried out vaccination experiments on 100 to 150 persons in Natzweiler, and of these experiments of the control group roughly 50 are said to have died. Miss Schmidt stated that she knew this, from notes that your technical assistant Miss Crodel had made about the typhus experiments at Natzweiler. Can you please tell the Tribunal what notes Miss Schmidt was referring to; in other words how do you explain her testimony?
A: It is utterly impossible for Fraulein Schmidt to have seen records of notes of my vaccinations in Natzweiler in which fatalities occurred, because as I have already said no one died showing the vaccinations. These notes of Fraulein Crodel's that Fraulein Schmidts saw do not refer to the vaccinations. That can be seen from the numbers that Fraulein Schmidt mentioned, because I only vaccinated 80 persons at Natzweiler, not 150 to 200 as the witness stated. This number and the concept of a control group the witness apparently took from later writings, which is to be discussed hereafter, but I can imagine what notes she could have been referring to.
Q: Please do that witness:
A: The witness states correctly when these notes were made, because she says the sun was shining on the pages. That must have been in the spring or summer of 1944. This corresponds with was time when the typhus epidemic was raging in the camp. Thus I am assuming that Fraulein Schmidt really did see genuine notes of some sort.
Q: Then witness you were saying that these were notes that were made in the course of an epidemic that took place in Natzweiler, can you tell us the time when this epidemic broke out?
A: So far as I can state from memory the epidemic broke out in February or March of 1944. Gradually the number of cases became very large, and in the summer it represented the very considerable number of roughly 1200.
Q: Let me point out in this connection that this epidemic is confirmed by two prosecution witnesses, Grandjean on 6 January, page 1099 of the transcript, and the witness Holl on 3 January 1947, page 1058 of the English transcript. Both witnesses stated that in the spring of 1944 and also in the summer following there was a severe typhus epidemic in Natzweiler. The witness Grandjean gave the number as 1200 to 1400 cases, as I remember, thus this would agree with what you have just said, witness. Now, the most important question in this connection, did the outbreak of this epidemic have any connection with your vaccinations, what I mean is were your vaccinations the cause of this epidemic?
A: No, there was no connection between the epidemic and our vaccinations. Our vaccinations had already been concluded in January 1944, and the first typhus cases occurred in February or March, and they were brought to the camp from outside, either by transports or from other camps. Let me repeat that the sick people were taken from outside camps to Schirmek where they were treated in a special department, because there was no way of isolating them in the outside camps.
Q: Let me point out the testimony of Grandjean about 6 January, page 1115, who says the same. He said he was a nurse in the typhus department of Natzweiler, and the sick persons whom he had to tend to came from the various commandoes and from that camp itself.
Now, witness, you said that the notes that Fraulein Schmidt mentioned could be in some way related to this epidemic, perhaps you could explain that to the Tribunal at greater length.
A: In order to be sure of a diagnosis that typhus really existed in a certain case one carried out the Weil-Felix reaction test, and took blood tests which were sent to the competent medical clinic to be analyzed. This clinic was in my hygienic institute in Strasbourg, Thus in the course of time we received a large number of blood samples of persons who were suspected of having typhus and were actually sick with typhus. This was a perfectly usual diagnostic examination, such as is usually carried out when typhus is expected, in order to clarify the diagnosis. It is apparent that I was interested in these cases to get a complete picture of the serological behavior of typhus patients. In my institute a doctors' thesis had been written on this subject, and for this reason the notes of these cases, if Miss Schmidt really saw the genuine notes, were supplied with notes so that we should not have to wait for further material. In this way it is of course quite possible that Fraulein Schmidt did add up 50 deaths.
Q: You say then that the cases Fraulein Schmidt mentioned were not deaths that occurred in the course of these vaccinations, but were deaths in the course of cases of typhus that occurred during the epidemic in the camp?
A: Yes, that is so. That can be seen from the fact of the time relation between the deaths of the epidemic and the alleged deaths of the vaccinations. The epidemic was in the summer. Miss Schmidt states that correctly, and I must assume that the notes she saw were the records of the serological tests, and which she falsely construed.
Q: Fraulein Schmidt said a lot about your work and yourself, Professor; we shall have to go into her testimony at considerable length; first, about herself, witness, she said that from 1 February on she was active under you in the hygienic institute, and gave the serological bacteriological courses to the students, is that so?
A: Yes, it is. Miss Schmidt from 1942 on she was a technical assistant. She was an assistant instructor of courses, and made the preparations for the practical students courses and assisted in the teaching of the courses themselves. Miss Schmidt, however, was not used in other technical work because she didn't have the necessary training, particularly not in the field of typhus, and for this reason she could not have had sufficient knowledge to be able to evaluate these duties.
Q: Then the witness simply prepared the students courses, but had nothing to do with the research work, is that so?
A: Yes.
Q: Professor, the witness said that she was the only assistant in the institute who was not vaccinated against typhus, is that so?
A: No, in the institute only that personnel was vaccinated against typhus that actually worked in the typhus laboratory. Miss Schmidt was not vaccinated because she was not used in this work. However, despite the fact that she was not vaccinated not realizing the danger she was running and the danger she might be causing for others, she entered the laboratory, although she was not permitted to do so. No one who knows typhus would do so.
Q: Was this prohibition something unusual; was this something that can be traced back to the desire to maintain secrecy?
A: No, that was not the reason. This was purely a precautionary measure. When working with the germs of dangerous diseases you have to be most careful and laboratories of this sort in all clinics are run with the same precautions. No one is to enter laboratories who does not work there. This had nothing to do with maintaining secrecy.
Q: The witness tried to make her testimony sound particularly weighty by saying she was the only Alsatian in the institute. She probably intended that would indicate that she was the only one that could tell the real truth about the work. Is this statement of hers correct?
A: That testimony is already refuted by the effect that on this witness stand there was another Alsatian, Fraulein Eyer, from my institute. There were at least ten out of the nineteen assistants Alsatians whom I could name now. In other words that testimony of Fraulein Schmidt is not correct.
Q: Now, Professor, further regarding Fraulein Schmidt's testimony. When asked by the prosecution whether you did breed a virulent typhus virus in your laboratory, she replied:
Yes, and this was done with guinea pigs.
She also stated that you, witness, had taken these guinea pigs to Natzweiler in order to infect the prisoners with them. What truth is there in that?
A: This statement is also completely wrong. It is correct to that extent only that we did keep infected guinea pigs in the laboratory with typhus virus because, as every specialist knows, the guinea pigs are, so to speak, the virus reservoir from which we could draw our virus whenever we wanted it, but this does not mean that the virus in these guinea pigs was pathogenic various. On the contrary, let me put that again that the more often a virus comes through an animal the more depleted it becomes.
Q: When you say pathogenic, you mean pathogenic to human beings?
A: Yes, I always do when I use that term. Let me repeat again, we did not have any virus pathogenic to human beings. Miss Schmidt said we took the infected guinea pigs to Natzweiler to infect the prisoners. For the reason I have just given that is practically impossible; moreover, you cannot artificially infect human beings with typhus in the way that Miss Schmidt seems to imagine and let guinea pigs run around and spread the germs. That is not the way you get typhus. That is not so. If a person is artificially infected with typhus, and this we know from literature, then it must be done from the fresh blood of another human being who has just gotten the disease and this must be transmitted to the healthy person who is to be infected. As we know from literature, that is the most certain way of infecting a person artificially with typhus. Every other way of infecting is uncertain and is therefore not to be used in any sort of experimentation. However, Fraulein Schmidt is correct in saying we took guinea pigs to Natzweiler; however, these were nice healthy guinea pigs and they were taken there because the prisoners were breeding guinea pigs in Natzweiler and also breeding mice, because that gave them a great deal of pleasure, I offer for collaboration of this the statement of Attendant Kauten.
Q: Then you are saying, witness, that Miss Schmidt had nothing to do with your actual research work, that she was not active in the typhus laboratory and that she was never alone or with you in Natzweiler. In this case, where do you think Miss Schmidt received all the knowledge she alleges to have and to which she testified here?
A: This knowledge she got from us or from me directly during our intermissions for tea at the institute. All the workers got together and the work was talked of without any effort to keep secrecy. Miss Schmidt was frequently at these intermissions for tea and heard all this there or later and reported on it later in this trial. The picture that she drew up is altogether incorrect, however.
Q: Something else that Miss Schmidt said seems important to me. Witness, she was asked if she knew of the Blanc vaccine from the Pasteur Institute in Tunis.
She said yes. Then she was asked if she knew if this vaccine, like yours, was made from living attenuated virus; she said that the Blanc vaccine was not used because of its dangerousness. Is that so what she says?
A: This statement of hers is also incorrect. I am sorry that Blanc is not here personally in order to refute this statement. It is absurd. Of course, Blanc's vaccine was made of living attenuated virus and had already been used to a large extent. Several million persons in North Africa were inoculated with this vaccine. There exist publications on this subject, too. The use of living attenuated virus is moreover quite old. The smallpox vaccine is the oldest we know that there is, Pasteur's hydrophobia rabies vaccine and the yellow fever vaccine, all of these are made with living attenuated virus; also the Calmette's tuberculosis vaccine, Strong's plague vaccine, etc. All of these having living virus in them.
Q: You mention Blanc's work, Professor. May I ask whether in completing your vaccine papers and in studying literature you made use of these French works on the subject?
A: Yes, I did, particularly on the work of French researchers because they seem worthy of emulation and to that extent I think that Miss Schmidt is correct.
Q: Miss Schmidt stated that you had used French works on this subject; this testimony is in the transcript of 9 January 1947, page 1380 of the English transcript. Witness, aside from Miss Schmidt, whose testimony I should like to leave for the moment, we also heard from Fraulein Olga Eyer. We had her on 15 January 1947, page 1755 of the English transcript. She said that you vaccinated with virulent vaccines. To that extent I believe she is correct, isn't she?
A: Yes, she heard me say that myself because she was my secretary and took care of my correspondence.
Q: Did Fraulein Eyer have medical knowledge? Did she have any specialized training in medicine?
A: No, Fraulein Eyer had no medical training, nor was she a medical technical assistant, nor was she trained as such. She was simply a secretary and in this capacity, because she had to do a lot of writing for me, she heard and used lots of medical expressions and terms. I am sure that she did not always understand these terms, because it is very difficult to do so unless you have the necessary medical training.
Q: Fraulein Eyer also admitted that before the Tribunal. She was asked whether she knew the report you had dictated and she said on page 1770 of the English transcript:
I wrote the reports but I don't know what was in them. I am not an expert and I have never studied medicine.
Now, another point regarding Fraulein Eyer's testimony. She stated correctly that you worked with virulent, that is living vaccines, but she further stated that this virulent vaccine brought about the disease. What do you have to say about that?
A: When Miss Eyer is speaking of virulent vaccine, this corresponds to what I said in my affidavit yesterday. These are living virus but they are not pathogenic for human beings, so she is correct in speaking of the living virus because that was what it was in the vaccine, but that this virulent vaccine should cause the disease is completely erroneous and simply proves again how difficult it is to use the terms correctly and what little value such testimony can have.
Q: Now, Professor, something most confused that the witness said was, when being examined by Mr. Handy, she said:
Yes, virulent vaccine was used.
Then Mr. Hardy asked:
Well, if you say virulent vaccine, do you mean virulent virus?
Then she said:
Yes, I meant to say virulent virus.
I assume that Mr. Hardy was referring here to pathogenic virus, although this would made this matter much clearer. Perhaps you can say something about this testimony?
A: Here the ideas that Fraulein Eyer has are completely mixed up. Every living vaccine does contain living and virulent virus, as I have already said. However, the important fact and the decisive element of the question is that this virus is no longer pathogenic for human beings. We have got to distinguish between "virulent" and "pathogenic" for human beings. Only the latter causes illness in human beings.
Q: It is your opinion then, Professor, that this witness' testimony gives only a very confused picture of the real situation and that the 'witness' knowledge did not suffice to correctly understand this difficult problem of virus and vaccine?
A: Yes, that is what I want to say. Let me say also that Fraulein Eyer had no idea of what was going on. As a specialist, I must regard her testimony here as completely worthless.
Q: Now in conclusion I want to quote something else she said. She answered my colleague Dr. Fritz' question saying:
As I have already said, I don't know enough about this.
This statement, which seems to be the most decisive thing she said, is on page 1778 of the English record.
Now, to go along chronologically, professor, when we stopped we were discussing your activity in connection with the epidemic at Natzweiler. You said that you carried on the serological examinations in your institute. Did you confine yourself to this, or did you do anything else in the camp in connection with the epidemic?
A: Yes. I have already told you that the camp commander asked me specifically to help render the camp sanitary. The camp, it is true, did have a delousing station but it was not large enough to take care of this acute situation. Particularly, the prisoner physicians drew my attention to this fact many times. When I was asked, then, to help them in this crisis, I made available to them a good disinfecting station that was in the Institute and which I had taken to Natzweiler. This substantially increased the delousing capacity in the camp so that it certainly contributed to protecting many of the prisoners from typhus and thus from certain death.
I also gave my assistance to the surgical department by turning over sterilization apparatus. I had one steam and two dry sterilizers which I made available. There is some correspondence on this.
Q: I shall have to bring up a few documents, Professor, which the prosecution put in in connection with the work at Natzweiler, apparently to prove that you carried on human experimentation in Natzweiler.
The first one is on page 85 of the document book, document number 134, Exhibit 301. This is a letter from you to Obersturmfueherer [Lieutenant] Dr. Krieger, Concentration Camp Natzweiler. You speak here of sending two fever thermometers, and you ask him to send you a list of those vaccinated, stating their age and when they were vaccinated. What does this letter refer to?
A: This letter you are mentioning refers to the fact that the camp had no or too few clinical thermometers and the prisoner doctors asked me to supply some. I then sent them two.
Then, in the case of the six persons vaccinated who are named here, these are camp personnel whose serological examination I wanted to enter into the records. They had been vaccinated with dead vaccines, and, as I have already told you, I was keeping an exhaustive serological record of all these vaccinations. They had nothing to do directly with my vaccinations in the camp.
Q: I turn now to the next document at page 100 in the document book XII. This is NO-133, Exhibit 311. This is a letter from you to the camp surgeon at the concentration camp Dachau of 21 October 1944. You are asking that fever graphs be sent to you that were drawn up by a Dutch doctor in Natzweiler. What were they?
A: This Dutch doctor was a prisoner doctor who had helped me with my vaccinations at Natzweiler, and who was in charge of the fever graphs. I, of course, wanted to have those graphs in the autumn for my records when the camp was moved.
It was very important to me to have these graphs, and I sent for them and got them.
Q: Now the third document I want to bring up is on page 102. This is document NO-136, Exhibit 313. This is a letter of yours of 16 November 1944 to the camp surgeon of the concentration camp Natzweiler, Untersturmfuehrer [Lieutenant] Rode. You are asking here for one autoclave, one steam vessel, and one round dry sterilizer. Does this apparatus have anything to do with your alleged human experimentation?
A: No. As I have said, this equipment was that which I had made available to the surgical department, and after the camp was dissolved, I wanted that back because it was valuable apparatus, particularly since we had had a direct bomb hit on our institute and lost a lot of equipment. This apparatus had nothing at all to do with human experimentation. I stress that this was apparatus used exclusively in the surgical department.
Q: You said that your vaccinations were carried out in December of 1943 and January of 1944. Thus they occurred before the epidemic which, according to your testimony, took place in the spring and summer of 1944. In the course of the epidemic, could you ascertain whether the vaccine you had used on the prisoners was effective?
A: Of course we could. All the prisoners were in the camp and none of these prisoners fell sick of typhus during the epidemic.
Q: What was the course of your work in typhus vaccines after February 1944?
A: I might return to the vaccinations of the winter of 1943-1944. Contrary to our expectations, some of those vaccinated had more severe reactions to the vaccination. Thus it could not yet be used on a large scale. My work, after these first vaccinations, was directed toward developing the vaccine by storing it away for a longer length of time toward further attenuating the vaccines so that the reactions would not be so severe. We reached, that aim in the summer of 1944. Then, as I have said, we had the fortunate result that of those whom we had vaccinated in the winter, none of them fell sick of typhus.
Therefore, I wished to continue with my vaccinations and asked for a larger number, namely, two hundred persons to be vaccinated so that I could carry out the vaccinations.
Q: I assume, Professor, that you made this request through the same channel that you have already mentioned, namely, Professor Hirt.
A: That is correct.
Q: Now, Professor, please take a look at two documents put in by the prosecution. The first is on page 88 of the document book, document NO-123, Exhibit 303. This is a letter from you to Professor Hirt of 9 May 1944. There is an appendix, another letter of 27 June 1944, from you to Hirt. This is document 127, Exhibit 306, and this is on page 84. Please take a look at those two letters, Professor, and tell me whether you were thinking of them when you just gave your testimony.
A: Yes, I was referring to these two letters.
Q: I turn now to Document NO-123. You mentioned there a study by you regarding your work with dry typhus vaccine. You say that your work showed that this vaccine had highly anti-infectious results. I understand that you mean that this vaccine was a protection against the disease itself. You used the same expression in Document NO-128, your report to the Reich Research Council, of 21 January 1944, and I believe I am correct in assuming that this concept is the core of the Prosecution's charge. The Prosecution believes that to test the efficacy of this vaccine the persons vaccinated were subsequently infected with virulent or as you call it pathogenic virus, and this deduction is supported by what you say in Document NO-127, because here you speak of subsequent infection with virulent typhus germs. Now in order to clarify this point will you please explain to the Tribunal in what way you tested the anti-infectious effects of the vaccine, or at any rate how did you wish to test this on 9 May 1944?
A: This is such an important question that I must go into some details in order to answer it, and above all to make myself comprehensible. If I contrast the anti-toxic to the anti-infectious effects, then I must refer to what I said at the beginning of my examination. A virus made from killed, which is a virulent virus, I differentiated from the vaccine made from living, virulent virus, and said that in virus diseases the killed virus, the killed vaccine, does not protect the person vaccinated against contracting the disease. In other words, it is not anti-infectious, but merely a means of reducing the severity of the disease. In other words, it only reduces the toxic effects of the germ. However, the purpose of anti-infectious vaccinations is to prevent the person contracting the disease at all. In other words, it is both anti-toxic and anti-infectious. The anti-infectious effects of the vaccine, however, result from the fact that like a natural infection, it immunizes the human body against subsequent infection with the same disease.
To substantiate this we have billions of cases of vaccination with other living virus. Let me point out this is one example: The vaccination with smallpox virus. What I am saying here is that we know that we have a certain — we have an absolutely certain anti-infectious protection. From this example you can see that living virus would result in such an anti-infectious vaccine. This immunity results if there are enough antibodies in the blood or tissues. These antibodies cancel out the effects of the germ that enters the body when a person contracts the disease. This virus is effective because its antigens are retained. The antigen is introduced into the body and is able to protect the body against subsequent infection, protect it against the toxicity of the disease germ. These antibodies are formed in the tissue and are then emptied into the body fluids, namely the blood or blood serum. These protective bodies in the blood we can demonstrate the existence of by the necessary Serological examination swiftly. That means that the vaccine content of antibodies rapidly decreases, but we know that the absence of antibodies in the blood is no proof that the body is not immune, no protection against new disease. That is very important for understanding this whole problem. The important factor is the immunity of the tissue, namely its content of antibodies. This content, however, cannot be proved directly but has to be proved indirectly in a serological way in that the titer values are analyzed before and after any subsequent vaccination. Then if the content of antibodies in a typhus vaccine sinks, we still cannot draw any conclusions regarding the degree of immunization of the person involved. But we can undertake a subsequent vaccination and from it draw enormously valuable conclusions. Two things can possibly happen in such a subsequent vaccination. First, the titer values will again rise, that is to say, the organism has reacted to the new vaccination by creating new protective bodies which have been emptied into the blood. This would have been a person who had previously not been fully immunized.
However, if we vaccinate a person in whom the titer values have sunk and the titer values do not then rise after the subsequent vaccination, then this proves that the person was completely immunized. It proves that the body does not create any more antibodies, and consequently no more antibodies appear in the blood. In order to ascertain this, you do not have to carry out an infection with a humanly pathogenic virus, but you can use an attenuated, a pathogenic virus such as we had in the virus. It was with the use of such a virus that the ascertainments were made of which this document speaks. These subsequent infections are referred to as "infections" both by me and in literature, but the virus in question is always an attenuated, a pathogenic virus. These are the scientific insights I have felt it necessary for me to state in order to allow this problem to be correctly evaluated.
In Natzweiler also with the persons who had been vaccinated we carried out this subsequent testing in a few weeks after the first vaccinated received a subsequent third vaccination, and then we conducted the necessary serological examinations. It turned out that all of these, all those who had been vaccinated, did not have any rise in titer values after the subsequent vaccination, proving that they had already all been immune.
For purposes of comparison we now add the group of 40 persons who had been vaccinated by skin scarification and we used them as a control group. I believe I need not go any further into these scientific matters. Further practical proof of the anti-infectious protection is to be found also in the fact that none of those vaccinated fell ill of typhus during the epidemic.
Q: Witness, before I continue in our discussion of those documents, an intermediary question: you said that in the way described, you tested the efficacy of your now vaccine in the laboratory already in December 1943 and January 1944. You further stated that your scientific conclusions prove to be correct according to what happened in the epidemic at Natzweiler, but I don't see why in June 1944 you planned, as can be seen from document NO-127, to start a new experimental series with 200 persons.
Why did you do that?
A: You are overlooking the fact, counsel, that above all, it was my intention to develop and to carry out vaccinations throughout the whole camp in order to render the whole camp immune so that there would be no further danger of typhus. And I also wished to eliminate this source of danger for the civilian population of Alsatia.
Since we could not carry out a larger production in the summer of 1944; I could not do this on a large scale, but I nevertheless felt that I could vaccinate 200 more. Thus making use of the experience we had from the first series, we wished to compare the general reactions that would occur in this second series.
Q: Now, witness, turn to Document NO-127. You said that probably there would not be such long lasting reactions as there were in the preliminary experiments. Now, when you use the expression "preliminary experiments", what do you mean and what is your reason for thinking that there the reactions would be less severe?
A: The preliminary experiments referred to are the first group that was vaccinated in the winter of 1943-'44 in which we ascertained that the reaction had to be reduced before the vaccine could be further used. This we did by storing the vaccine away for a longer period of time. I now had this stored away vaccine available because I had done no further vaccinating. In the meantime, I was able to store this vaccine away, and when we used it again, we saw that the reaction was considerably less severe.
Q: But, Professor, let me put this to you: in the next paragraph you speak of subsequent infection with virulent typhus germs, and you say that this was necessary in order to prove dearly the anti-infectious effects of the vaccine. But you just said that you wanted to test the anti-infectious effect by subsequent vaccination and serological examination. Now how can these two things what you just said on the stand and what is stated here in this document be brought into any sort of an agreement with one another? It looks to me like a contradiction.
A: I admit that when you see this statement from the prospective of this trial, it does look a little suspicious, and I can't hold it against a layman for reading into my words a meaning that was not intended. To explain this sentence, I may return to what I said to explain the terms anti-infectious immunity and subsequent infection. When I say subsequent infection, I am referring to the subsequent vaccination with living virulent virus containing vaccine, namely the third vaccination that I carried out in this group.
Q: Professor, you are making synonymous the word "infection" with "vaccination", using vaccines from living — namely, virulent—virus. Is the fact that you are making these words synonyms an invention of your own, or is this customary usage in literature and in science?
A: Every vaccination with a vaccine that contains living virus in an infection person. That I must emphasize very clearly. For this reason alone, I had no misgivings about using the word in this context; moreover, I must emphasize, I didn't intend to let the persons who read my letter see clearly into my intentions and what I was doing, so that I used this expression here with no misgivings at all.
Q: Now, Professor, why were you being so secretive about this?
A: Well, I knew that this problem or similar problems were being worked on elsewhere, but I didn't know whether or not my letter would fall into the hands of persons who would be interested in the way I was approaching the problem; and because these were important new scientific discoveries, which I of course wanted to reserve the right to evaluate, I phrased myself somewhat unclearly to keep my secrets to myself. To determine anti-infectious immunity, I carried out the serological examinations that I already mentioned. These serological examinations have been carried out in other virus diseases — in smallpox, above all, and it had proved itself in animal experiments. I carried out examinations in this matter of smallpox for ten or twelve years and had proved the anti-infectious immunity by such indirect methods.
Q: Professor, is this synonymous use "infection" with "vaccination", "subsequent vaccination" and "subsequent infection", customary in literature? If so, perhaps you could give the Tribunal an example.
A: Yes. In literature also we find these two words used synonymously, so that I had no misgivings in using this word. As example, I can give you the title of a French work by Blanc, Noury and Baltazard, in the publication of the French Academy of Science.
This is Volume 201, page 1226, year 1935. The title reads:
Prescance et premunition an cours du typhus exanthematique et an cours d' une infection inapparante par 1c virus biliaire.
Q: Witness, please speak more slowly, otherwise the correct terms will not get into the record.
A: The translation — prescance and premunition are very difficult to translate.
In the course of typhus exanthematicus and in the course of an invisible infection by virus combined with gall.
The two words used in the title, "prescance" and "premunition", are difficult to translate. They mean roughly, the continuance of the germ to exist in the organism, and pre-immunization. I might read a brief excerpt from this text:
Nine of those vaccinated were examined by infection with pure virus. One reacted to this virulent inoculation.
The authors here are using "inoculation" and "infection" synonymously. They then continue:
From numerous subsequent experiments, we have ascertained that the vaccine virus (virus vaccine) remains in the organism of the person vaccinated for 25 to 30 days.
I quote further:
The subsequent inoculation was carried out at the moment when the persons vaccinated had an in apparent infection (infection inapparante). Comparison experiments shew that a vaccine killed with phenol provides no immunization against a virulent infection (infection virulente), and it was this time that the inoculation took place.
Here these French authors are obviously using "vaccination" and "infection" synonymously. Thus you can see in what context the word "infection" can be used.
DR. TIPP: Mr. President, the work that the witness just cited is unfortunately available only in French, but I believe that what you have heard from it already is enough to serve our purposes. If you wish, however, I can have the work translated.
THE PRESIDENT: If counsel believes that any such extracts for any such work can be held to the Tribunal, they can be translated and submitted as a document.
It is not necessary to take the time of the Tribunal listening to a witness read them from the stand. Anything like that can be more simply submitted. How much longer; counsel; do you anticipate this examination of this witness will continue?
DR. TIPP: One hour at the most tomorrow.
THE PRESIDENT: I will hand to the clerk two extra copies of this German document which are not necessary for the Tribunal. The Tribunal will now be in recess until nine-thirty tomorrow morning.
THE MARSHAL: The Tribunal will be in recess until nine-thirty o'clock tomorrow morning.
(The Tribunal adjourned until 19 June 1947; 0930 hours.)