SS Medical Corps

[5] For example, they helped develop the first methods of gassing patients using carbon monoxide from the exhaust fumes of lorries (vans).

Stemming from a secret memorandum signed into effect by Hitler authorizing the killing of "useless eaters" and people considered an economic burden on German society on 9 October 1939, Operation T4 eventually evolved into the Law for Euthanasia for the Incurably Ill.[5] According to historian Götz Aly, the first commandants of the death camps at Belzec, Sobibor and Treblinka came out of Operation T4 and "were on its payroll.

During the war's progression, the Waffen-SS had a continuously developing structure for physicians which was highly complex, so sometime in August 1943, Himmler united all the medical branches of the SS and placed them under the command of Reicharzt-SS Ernst-Robert Grawitz, much like the Surgeon-General of the army.

[9] People deemed inferior or undesirable became human guinea pigs and were exploited for scientific research by SS doctors as they conducted inhumane medical experiments at the camps.

[10][11] Human medical experiments, the most notorious of which occurred at Dachau concentration camp and Auschwitz reached their zenith during the war.

[12][13] During this period of time one of the most infamous SS doctors, Josef Mengele, served as Head Medical Officer of Auschwitz and was responsible for the daily gas chamber selections as well as brutal experiments (including those on human twins).

In the former East Germany for instance, Hermann Voss became a respected anatomist, while Eugen Wannenmacher obtained a post as a professor at the University of Münster and Mengele's former sponsor and mentor, Otmar Freiherr von Verschuer, continued operating his medical practice.