Izvorni znanstveni članak
The typhus epidemic in camps for the Volksdeutsch in Slavonia 1945/1946 and its consequences
Vladimir Geiger
Sažetak
No less than 10 000 to 20 000 Croatian Volksdeutsch, the majority of those who remained in their homeland after World War Two, were placed in internment and work camps during 1945, 1946, and 1947. In addition to poor living conditions, the fate of the inmates was made even more difficult by poor diet, insufficient opportunities to maintain hygiene, lack of medicines and medical care, various contagious diseases, as well as hard physical labour in frequently unfavourable weather. Many inmates became ill and died. The cause of death was most often diseases, especially dysentery and typhus, but also fatigue and starvation. The killing of Volksdeutsch, except in a few indisputable cases, did not occur. Health problems among the aged, the weak, and the young appeared immediately after the opening of the camps for Volksdeutsch in Croatia (as elsewhere in Yugoslavia), and then various contagious diseases started to spread. It is clear from the course of events that adequate medical measures to protect the inmates were not in place from the very beginning. Despite worsening conditions and developments, the specific directives of the Ministry of Public Health of the People’s Government of Croatia in Zagreb and the Federal Ministry of Public Health in Belgrade in November 1945, which initiated a major campaign against typhus in the country as a whole, were not observed in the camps. Not only was the spread of typhus not halted, rather, in the following days and months, it grew into an epidemic. In the fall/winter of 1945 and the winter of 1946 the ravages of the typhus epidemic took on frightening
proportions. Due to extremely poor living conditions, especially bad hygienic conditions (the inability to wash or change clothes, bathe), the constant appearance of parasites (flees, lice, bedbugs, etc.), terrible food (i.e. hunger), and cold, typhus overwhelmed the camps. The largest number of deaths among the interned Volksdeutsch occurred in January, February, and March 1946. Typhus was most likely the leading cause of death among inmates in this period which testimonies/memoirs and German/Volksdeutsch historiography marks as the typhus epidemic. Only in late March and early April 1946, when
all the necessary measures against typhus were taken in the camps in Valpovo and Krndija, as well as in other camps in Croatia and Yugoslavia, was typhus for the most part eliminated. Since the spread of typhus among the general Croatian population and in the army was successfully brought under control in a timely manner to avoid a widespread epidemic, it is unclear why the typhus epidemic in the camps for Volksdeutsch was not similarly brought under control effectively and on time.
Ključne riječi
Volksdeutsch; Yugoslavia; Croatia; Slavonia; 1945; postwar internment camps; typhus
Hrčak ID:
19017
URI
Datum izdavanja:
16.10.2007.
Posjeta: 4.160 *