Austrian Doctor Asperger 'Sent Kids' to Death as Part of Nazi Program - Study

The world-renowned pediatrician and autism researcher, after whom Asperger's syndrome is named, has always been considered a strong opponent of Hitler's regime, but turns out to have been a Nazi collaborator, a recent study has revealed.

Hans Asperger, a prominent autism doctor from Austria, is said to have been involved in the Nazi euthanasia program, according to research by Herwig Czech from the Medical University in Vienna.

Until recently, the doctor was considered an opponent of the Nazi regime, but in fact he played a key role in murders of disabled children during the Nazi era.

"The point is that someone who was almost praised as a resistance fighter in recent years actually doesn't pass this test," the author of the study, published in the scientific journal "Molecular Autism," said on Thursday.

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According to Czech, Asperger was responsible for sending two girls, aged two and five, to the notorious Am Spiegelgrund facility within Vienna's Steinhof psychiatric hospital.

The clinic was a part of the Nazi euthanasia program that resulted in 800 boys and girls being killed. Although Czech claims that while Asperger was not a part of the euthanasia program, he still "shared responsibility, as so often in Nazi crimes."

Asperger was a member of a committee tasked with diagnosing 200 patients in a children's ward at another hospital, 35 of whom were said to be "uneducable" and later died. The doctor also "publicly legitimized race hygiene policies including forced sterilizations," Czech wrote in his research.

Asperger is now known to have discovered a mild form of autism, the main symptoms of which are contact and communication deficiencies. The syndrome was named after him following his death in 1980.