I Was A Doctor In Auschwitz Sparknotes

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During the Holocaust, the Nazis segregated prisoners according to gender and treated them differently. In all the extermination camps, women, whether they were healthy and strong, were automatically sent to their death in the crematories if they were pregnant or had small children with them. A gynecologist, Dr. Gisella Perl focuses little on her own suffering as she tries her hardest not only to save the lives of pregnant women but to also portray life in the women's camps through her memoir, I was a Doctor in Auschwitz. The book was published in 1948 by International Universities Press, Inc. in Madison, CT. The memoir documents the horror Dr. Perl witnessed in her time in Auschwitz, a forced labor camp in Germany, and Bergen-Belsen, where Dr. …show more content…

She begins to perform these abortions once she sees with her own eyes how brutally mothers were being beaten. For instance, Dr. Perl says, "It was up to me save the life of mothers, if there was no other way, then destroying their unborn children" (113-114). Dr. Perl saved the lives of these pregnant women to avoid having them sent to the crematory had the Nazis discovered their pregnancy. Perl felt strong about what she had witnessed, she took it upon herself to let other women know what she had seen to prevent other mothers from them going through that. Being a gynecologist in Auschwitz was not easy for Perl for the fact that she set aside her feelings and emotions while she performed abortions. On page 114, she says, "No one will ever know what it meant to destroy these babies. After years and years of medical practice, childbirth was still the most beautiful, the greatest miracle of nature". This demonstrates how strong Dr. Perl had to be in order to save women's lives even if meant that meant to kill one of "the greatest miracle of nature" as she put

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