Slaughtered like animals. Revealing the atrocities committed by the Nazis on captives at Treblinka I by skeletal trauma analysis

Abstract The infamous Treblinka camp was one of numerous extermination camps throughout Poland, where Germans carried out mass killings of Jews. There were two camps in Treblinka, AL Treblinka I, a forced labor camp, and KL Treblinka II, the site of the extermination camp. Treblinka I held captives of various origins and ethnic backgrounds who were serving their sentences by working in a pre-existing gravel pit. Many of those prisoners perished in the camp, and it was believed that the principal causes of their death were attributed to the horrific sanitary conditions in the camp as well as the strenuous hard work of daily life. In 2019, archaeologists uncovered a clandestine mass burial pit that contained commingled human skeleton remains at the Execution Site of the former Treblinka I camp. It was estimated that there were a minimum of forty-nine people in the pit. Within months, an anthropologist performed biological profile assessments and detailed trauma analysis on the recovered skeletal parts. The main goal was to study perimortem trauma patterns to infer the cause and manner of death of the victims. We hypothesized that the victims did not die solely because of the camps’ conditions but were brutally slaughtered by the camp guards. Our results were later compared with the survivors’ written testimonies. As a result of our research, we were able to show that the Treblinka I captives’ death was extremely brutal and that the killing methods were varied. This led us to conclude that multiple assailants were involved in the killing spree. All of our results were consistent with the written witness testimonies, which concurs with our skeletal material analysis that proves the atrocities committed by the Nazis on their civilian prisoners during the war took place

Molecular Diagnosis of COVID-19 Sudden and Unexplained Deaths: The Insidious Face of the Pandemic

The COVID-19 epidemic has led to a significant increase in the number of deaths. This has resulted in forensic autopsies focusing on additional diagnostic possibilities. The following article is a summary of 23 autopsies of sudden and unexplained deaths. Particularly noteworthy are the described cases of children whose deaths were originally classified as SIDS (sudden infant death syndrome). All tests were performed at the Department of Forensic Medicine and Forensic Genetics, Pomeranian Medical University in Szczecin. Autopsy analyses were extended to include diagnostics of the SARS-CoV-2 virus using molecular methods and a detailed histopathological analysis of lung tissue. The material for molecular tests consisted of a nasopharyngeal swab taken postmortem and a lung tissue homogenate. In both cases, the RT-PCR method with CT cut-off point analysis was used for diagnosis. In all analyzed cases, the lungs showed massive congestion and increased fragility and cohesion. The tested material showed the presence of the SARS-CoV-2 virus, which indicated various stages of infection. It was observed that the higher the virus expression in the lungs, the lower or undetectable it was in the nasopharyngeal swab. This may explain false negative results during life in swabs. An interesting finding is that child deaths classified as SIDS also showed the presence of the virus. This may constitute a new direction of research

Perpetrators from Treblinka: interdisciplinary investigations of seven single graves with “Trawniki Men”

Abstract At the Treblinka extermination and forced labor camp only a few SS soldiers and around a hundred watchmen kept guard over thousands of prisoners. Despite their lower rank in the Nazi hierarchy than SS soldiers, watchmen were vital to implementing “Operation Reinhard” in the field. Prisoners in Nazi camps were terrified by their brutality and ruthlessness. The guards were intermediaries between the camp’s inmates and the commanding crew, so in cases of a prisoners’ riot, they were the first target. The historical records mention several incidents where the watchmen died at the hands of the captives. However, little is known regarding how the dead bodies of the guards were treated nor what the funeral customs looked like in the camps. In 2019, a row of individual burials was discovered at the former Treblinka extermination and forced labor camp. Seven of those graves were explored to identify the people buried in such an unusual manner and to find out what had caused their deaths. A thorough multidisciplinary study, combining the forensic disciplines of archaeology, anthropology, medicine, and genetics provided the answer. Considering archaeological findings, it can be deduced that the graves belong to the Treblinka guards. The analysis conducted by an anthropologist indicates that the assessed biological profile aligns with the antemortem data of the Treblinka watchmen. Moreover, a study examining perimortem trauma has unveiled that out of the seven men studied, at least two met a violent demise. These findings are crucial in narrowing down the identification process. The results of our study contribute to a general understanding of the funerary customs prevalent in concentration camps worldwide. Prior to this work, there had never been any analysis or publication of the characteristics of watchmen graves at Nazi camps, making our results unique

Historical Y. pestis genomes reveal the Black Death as source of ancient and modern plague pandemics

International audienc

Historical Y. pestis Genomes Reveal the European Black Death as the Source of Ancient and Modern Plague Pandemics

International audienc