# Liberated Holocaust survivors dying when given food **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [January 26, 2010, 1:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/liberated-holocaust-survivors-dying-when-given-food/526453 "2010-01-26T01:19:44Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [September 12, 2011, 3:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/liberated-holocaust-survivors-dying-when-given-food/526453/41 "2011-09-12T03:52:06Z")
Was just skimming Anna Reid’s new book, _Leningrad: The Epic Siege of World War II, 1941-1944_ (Walker & Co. 2011), and on pp. 274-275 found this passage re: the partial evacuation of the city in early 1942: “…Diarists describe queuing for hours for soup, being unable to find anywhere to sleep, and fighting for places on the trains onwards through unoccupied Russia. Nor, when food was available, were measures initially taken to prevent the starving from killing themselves by overeating. A doctor ordered to set up a medical station at Zhikharevo discovered that evacuees were immediately eating all the dry rations - smoked sausage and bread - given them for the three-day journey onward to Tikhvin, and bursting their stomachs… Having described the results of his autopsies he persuaded [Soviet officials] that evacuees should instead be fed in small quantities en route, with millet and semolina cooked in the train boilers.” The story comes originally from Ales Adamovich and Daniil Granin, _A Book of the Blockade_ (Hilda Perham, Moscow 1983), pp. 435-438. ---
**Author:** ![user\_hostile](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/user_hostile/32/474_2.png) [@user\_hostile](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/user_hostile)\ **Post date:** [September 12, 2011, 9:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/liberated-holocaust-survivors-dying-when-given-food/526453/42 "2011-09-12T09:00:43Z")
This is [pertinent](http://www.amazon.com/Great-Starvation-Experiment-Starved-Science/dp/0816651612/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1315817925&sr=8-1)to the discussion. ---
**Author:** ![chorpler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chorpler/32/2888_2.png) [@chorpler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chorpler)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2011, 3:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/liberated-holocaust-survivors-dying-when-given-food/526453/43 "2011-09-13T15:10:14Z")
> [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](#): > > Was just skimming Anna Reid’s new book, _Leningrad: The Epic Siege of World War II, 1941-1944_ (Walker & Co. 2011), and on pp. 274-275 found this passage re: the partial evacuation of the city in early 1942: How disturbing. But, to clarify, this isn’t the same thing as the “refeeding syndrome” mentioned above, right? It’s just straightforward gorging until the stomach bursts, which could kill anybody, right? Although … would someone suffering from chronic malnourishment be more prone to this kind of thing because their stomach would be smaller than usual? ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2011, 6:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/liberated-holocaust-survivors-dying-when-given-food/526453/44 "2011-09-13T18:16:34Z")
This is the sort of story that one suspects could have significantly grown with the telling. Consider the sequence fo events: A - Allied soldiers liberate a concentration camp B - They find hideously emaciated, starving prisoners in horrifying conditions C - They give the prisoners food D - Some of the prisoners die The fact that D followed C does not necessarily mean C caused D. One would assume a mistreated, starved person could die from any number of things, and might have died no matter what. But the memory of the people present will naturally tend towards assuming a cause and effect relationship, and the flashbulb-memory nature of such a shocking experience would really sear it into your brain. And of course, over time, the number of prisoners who died immediately after being fed would probably grow the more the story was told. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2015, 3:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/liberated-holocaust-survivors-dying-when-given-food/526453/45 "2015-06-21T03:45:04Z")
Bumped. I recently finished Scott Turow’s very good WWII novel _Ordinary Heroes_ (Warner Books 2005). On p. 430, the U.S. Army has liberated a German concentration camp, and two Americans walk among the emaciated prisoners: “Some of those we passed, with their scraps of clothing and impossibly vacant looks, begged for crumbs. [Lt.] Grove [who had been there since the day before] warned me not to oblige them. The troops who arrived yesterday had given candy and tinned rations to the first inmates they saw. Rioting had broken out and then several of the prisoners who’d won the grim struggle that ensued had died when their intestinal systems revolted as a result of their gorging.” Turow acknowledges in an afterword that this is a fictionalized version of the Balingen concentration camp; he also drew on accounts of the liberation of Bergen-Belsen (p. 491). He does not provide a citation for this particular incident. ---
**Author:** ![Cabin\_Fever\_1](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cabin_fever_1/32/2908_2.png) [@Cabin\_Fever\_1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cabin_Fever_1)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2015, 5:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/liberated-holocaust-survivors-dying-when-given-food/526453/46 "2015-06-21T05:12:46Z")
I am going to add to this bump. I have never been aware of this syndrome, but from my quick search, it is quite real. > **[Refeeding syndrome: what it is, and how to prevent and treat it](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2440847/)** ---
**Author:** ![grude](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e47774/32.png) [@grude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/grude)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2015, 5:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/liberated-holocaust-survivors-dying-when-given-food/526453/47 "2015-06-21T05:35:10Z")
I know of someone in real life and modern times that due to a stroke(unknown at the time) couldn’t swallow so wasted away for months and months with little nutrition or water. When hospitalized finally they were put on a feeding tube and IV saline drips, they experienced problems with this including massive edema. The explanation offered was that their body and in particular kidneys were not only in bad shape from the wasting but had adapted to the minimal input. Then when they were flooded by normal intake it took a while to adapt back and recover. ---
**Author:** ![bob\_2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bob_2/32/3341_2.png) [@bob\_2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bob_2)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2015, 1:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/liberated-holocaust-survivors-dying-when-given-food/526453/48 "2015-06-21T13:29:21Z")
There was a BBc documentary about this, about the camp at bergen Belsen where they found tens of thousands of inmates - living (just) and dead. > [@](#): > > The liberators also encountered around 50,000 ‘survivors’. With ribs protruding through taut dry skin, bellies distended, these shaven-headed ‘living skeletons’ lay or sat in their own filth on the open ground or in the tiered bunks of the camp’s barrack blocks. Some were too weak even to respond to the British troops, and stared into the distance with bulging, glazed eyes. > [@](#): > > It is sobering that, despite all these efforts, 13,000 Belsen inmates died after liberation. Some inmates had been starved for so long that they had lost the ability to digest the rations that well-meaning British soldiers offered them; within minutes of taking a biscuit, some inmates just passed away. > > Largely through trial and error, the medical staff developed special nutritious but easily-digested concoctions for the inmates. Undertaking these relief efforts took a heavy psychological toll on the British medics. One doctor commented that if they did not get blind drunk each night they would all ‘go stark staring mad’. > **[BBC - History - World Wars: Liberation of the Concentration Camps](https://www.bbc.co.uk/history/worldwars/wwtwo/liberation_camps_01.shtml)** > > The Allies' horrific discoveries, by Dr Stephen A Hart Books New Beginnings: Holocaust Survivors in Bergen-Belsen and the British Zone in Germany, 1945-1950 by Hagit Lavsky (Wayne State University Press, 2002) The Liberation of a Concentration Camp by Joanne Reilly (Routledge, 1998) The Relief of Belsen, April 1945: Eye-Witness Accounts compiled by Paul Kemp (Imperial War Museum, London, 1991) Witness to Evil: Bergen-Belsen by Isaac Levy (Peter Hablan, 1995) ---
**Author:** ![Tim\_T-Bonham.net](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/46a35a/32.png) [@Tim\_T-Bonham.net](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tim_T-Bonham.net)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2015, 8:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/liberated-holocaust-survivors-dying-when-given-food/526453/49 "2015-06-21T20:56:42Z")
The concentration camp prisoners were dying from malnutrition, overwork, and diseases at the rate of 6-8 people per hour in spring of 1945. Those bodily physical conditions had developed over months. Having the camp suddenly liberated isn’t going to change that death rate immediately. The overwork will stop, and better feeding will commence, but the body can’t recover immediately. And I can easily see a sudden change to a good diet after months of starvation bringing on serious situations. I’ve often given myself a bout of diarrhea at the start of sweet corn or bing cherry season. I’m in good physical health, so it doesn’t hurt me much. But given the weakened condition of many of those prisoners, that would have easily caused their death. I think many of the stories about people dying after eating are due to coincidence. Given the death rate of one death every 8-10 minutes, plus the fact that soldiers are likely to have picked out one of the most stricken people to give 3 packets of sugar to, her death after eating it was likely unrelated to the sugar. She was probably at the point of death already. At least the soldier with his sugar managed to give her a bit of kindness before she went. ---
**Author:** ![Leo\_Bloom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/leo_bloom/32/10377_2.png) [@Leo\_Bloom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leo_Bloom)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2015, 1:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/liberated-holocaust-survivors-dying-when-given-food/526453/50 "2015-06-23T01:10:51Z")
> [@t-bonham@scc.net](#): > > The concentration camp prisoners were dying from malnutrition, overwork, and diseases at the rate of 6-8 people per hour in spring of 1945. > > … Cite? Need to know more, otherwise that number is kind of meaningless in the universe of concentration camps, extermination camps, and methods. For example, people whipped from train car to gas chamber I presume are not “prisoners,”–or are they when this number was devised? Auschwitz-Birkenau was doing 12,000 people a day by that time. ---
**Author:** ![Melbourne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b5e925/32.png) [@Melbourne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Melbourne)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2015, 2:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/liberated-holocaust-survivors-dying-when-given-food/526453/51 "2015-06-23T02:54:17Z")
> [@Cabin\_Fever](#): > > I am going to add to this bump. > I have never been aware of this syndrome, but from my quick search, it is quite real. > [Refeeding syndrome: what it is, and how to prevent and treat it - PMC](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2440847/) And when I fly international, “refuge diet” (low fat, restricted calories) is one of the menu options. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2015, 2:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/liberated-holocaust-survivors-dying-when-given-food/526453/52 "2015-06-23T14:47:21Z")
> [@t-bonham@scc.net](#): > > I think many of the stories about people dying after eating are due to coincidence. I think this is very likely. ---
**Author:** ![bob\_2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bob_2/32/3341_2.png) [@bob\_2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bob_2)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2015, 3:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/liberated-holocaust-survivors-dying-when-given-food/526453/53 "2015-06-23T15:34:23Z")
This is a video with actual interviews from the chief medical officer and some junior doctors at the liberation of Belsen. They talk about how “feeding the starving could do more harm than good” and the “Bengal Famine mixture” which was a pretty disgusting mixture of glucose and other substances that even the starving refused to eat at first. They do not say that anyone actually died from being fed, but since they were surrounded by the dead and dying, that is hardly surprising. [![]( " - YouTube") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M7a_9fzh5IM) ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2021, 3:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/liberated-holocaust-survivors-dying-when-given-food/526453/54 "2021-02-23T03:48:18Z")
Bumped. I just got a long fundraising letter from the National Museum of the Surface Navy in L.A., which includes a description of the sinking of the USS _Indianapolis_ during WWII (as mentioned in _Jaws_). One survivor of the sinking, pulled from the Pacific after four and a half days afloat, is described as being “given a long, painful shower, fed fresh water from a teaspoon so his stomach would not burst, and then [he] slept for 24 hours straight.” ---
**Author:** ![Paul\_was\_in\_Saudi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/b77776/32.png) [@Paul\_was\_in\_Saudi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Paul_was_in_Saudi)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2021, 11:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/liberated-holocaust-survivors-dying-when-given-food/526453/55 "2021-02-23T11:56:15Z")
My goodness, it was fifteen years ago I asked here about [Treatment for Starvation.](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/treatment-for-starvation/355888) ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2024, 9:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/liberated-holocaust-survivors-dying-when-given-food/526453/56 "2024-11-04T21:10:44Z")
Bumped. There is mention in David Grann’s _The Wager: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny and Murder_, about the shipwreck of a British warship in 1741, about two near-starving sailors dying after too greedily eating lots of seal meat. ---
**Author:** ![DPRK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4491bb/32.png) [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2024, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/liberated-holocaust-survivors-dying-when-given-food/526453/58 "2024-11-04T22:20:12Z")
Sounds like a possible case of [Vitamin A poisoning](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypervitaminosis_A)? > Liver is high in vitamin A. The liver of certain animals, including the polar bear, bearded seal, fish and walrus, are particularly toxic (see [Liver (food) § Poisoning](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liver_(food)#Poisoning)). It has been estimated that consumption of 500 grams (18 oz) of polar bear liver would result in a toxic dose for a human. ---
**Author:** ![needscoffee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/needscoffee/32/1076_2.png) [@needscoffee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/needscoffee)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2024, 12:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/liberated-holocaust-survivors-dying-when-given-food/526453/59 "2024-11-05T00:00:01Z")
> [@DPRK](#): > > Sounds like a possible case of [Vitamin A poisoning](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypervitaminosis_A)? Did his book say they ate the liver? ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2024, 2:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/liberated-holocaust-survivors-dying-when-given-food/526453/61 "2024-11-05T02:42:46Z")
> [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](#): > > about two near-starving sailors dying after too greedily eating lots of seal meat. Shoulda stuck with the cabin boy. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2024, 2:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/liberated-holocaust-survivors-dying-when-given-food/526453/62 "2024-11-05T02:50:02Z")
Note that the wiki article on Dachau, post liberation, does not mention anyone dying from food, but some from typhus. The same with Auschwitz. I have known, from search and rescue, that we were told to feed slowly and in small amounts as often if fed too much their shrunken stomachs would vomit it all back up. On someone as frail as the survivors were, that could be fatal, I guess. > [@badbadrubberpiggy](#): > > It’s also in **Band of Brothers** , the soldiers are feeding the concentration camp victims they find, and are told to stop by a doctor (?). That could well be due to what i just mentioned. > [@RickJay](#): > > This is the sort of story that one suspects could have significantly grown with the telling. Consider the sequence fo events: > > A - Allied soldiers liberate a concentration camp > B - They find hideously emaciated, starving prisoners in horrifying conditions > C - They give the prisoners food > D - Some of the prisoners die > > The fact that D followed C does not necessarily mean C caused D. One would assume a mistreated, starved person could die from any number of things, and might have died no matter what I like this hypothesis. > [@bob\_2](#): > > It is sobering that, despite all these efforts, 13,000 Belsen inmates died after liberation. From the wiki article on Belsen- _Immediately before and after liberation, prisoners were dying at around 500 per day, mostly from typhus._ and _The British troops and medical staff tried these diets to feed the prisoners, in this order:[[31]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bergen-Belsen_concentration_camp#cite_note-31)_ \*\* [Bully beef](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bully_beef) from Army rations. Most of the prisoners’ digestive systems were in too weak a state from long-term starvation to handle such food.\* \*\* [Skimmed milk](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skimmed_milk). The result was a bit better, but still far from acceptable.\* \*\* Bengal Famine Mixture. This is a rice-and-sugar-based mixture which had achieved good results after the [Bengal famine of 1943](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bengal_famine_of_1943), but it proved less suitable to Europeans than to Bengalis because of the differences in the food to which they were accustomed.[[32]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bergen-Belsen_concentration_camp#cite_note-Riley143-32) Adding the common ingredient [paprika](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paprika) to the mixture made it more palatable to these people and recovery started.\* [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/liberated-holocaust-survivors-dying-when-given-food/526453.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/liberated-holocaust-survivors-dying-when-given-food/526453.md?page=4)