German Medical Association apologises for Nazi docs' 'sadistic experiments' on Jews during WW II

The German Medical Association has apologised for the sadistic experiments carried out by Nazi doctors on Jews during the Second World War.

The organisation has admitted that many doctors, during Nazi-rule in the Second World War, were guilty of 'scores of human rights violations' and performed pseudo-scientific experiments on concentration camp inmates, including at Auschwitz.

They were also key to the Nazi's programme of forced sterilisation or euthanasia of the mentally ill while others were being deemed 'unworthy of life'.

In a statement to the Daily Mail, the German Medical Association said, "these crimes were not the actions of individual doctors but involved leading members of the medical community.

"The crimes should be taken as a warning for the future," it added.

The report said that perhaps the most notorious Nazi doctor was Auschwitz medic Josef Mengele, who was also known as the 'Angel of Death'. He consigned arrivals to the gas chambers and carried out appalling medical experiments on Jews, most of whom died in agony without anaesthetics

Mengele is known to have escaped to Brazil at the end of the war and for decades was the most wanted Nazi war criminal. He died in 1979 after suffering a stroke while swimming.

Another infamous Nazi doctor was Dr Aribert Heim, the so-called 'Doctor Death', who would inject substances such as petrol, water or poison directly into his victims' hearts.

Heim's actions earned him a place as the most-wanted Nazi war criminal, and was captured in a general round-up of leading Nazis by US forces in March 1945. He was later released because his name did not appear on any of the lists of war criminals which the Allies had quickly drawn up.

He became a gynaecologist in West Germany until 1962, where he opened up a gynaecological practice.