(Courtesy of MIMEH) The Maimonides Institute for Medicine, Ethics and the Holocaust (MIMEH) and the USC Shoah Foundation are partnering to develop new and innovative educational programing on medical ethics and the Holocaust.
The new partnership will create a clearinghouse for resources and tools for education and research related to medicine, ethics and the Holocaust, making it a first of its kind in the field. Because educating and training medical and health professionals on the history of the Holocaust can serve as a safeguard to prevent a recurrence of what has been labeled the only example of medically sanctioned genocide in history, the partnership will also aim to engage with additional partners over the next year.
Key components of the partnership will be the development of a testimony-based online curriculum aligned with medical and health professions curricula. As such, the resources will be of particular interest to medical and health professions faculty, as well as those seeking continuing education credits in the health professions.
A range of human-story-centered teaching and learning resources will be at the core of the educational resources produced by the partnership. An IWitness webpage co-curated by the partnership will also be launched.
Dr. Stacy Gallin, founding director of the Maimonides Institute for Medicine, Ethics and the Holocaust, based in Marlboro, and the co-chair of the department of bioethics and the Holocaust of the International Chair of Bioethics, described how testimony from the Visual History Archive will help inform—and humanize—the medical curriculum.
“Incorporating the diverse VHA testimony allows us to use the lessons of the past to help foster a personal and professional ethos within healthcare that values the protection of human rights and the central principles of equality, justice and human dignity for all,” Gallin said. “It also allows us to restore some of the dignity and humanity that were lost at the hands of Nazi medicine.”
Kellan Grady, a basketball player at the University of Kentucky who accompanied Gallin and Eva Mozes Kor, a survivor of Mengele’s twin experiments, on a trip to Auschwitz in 2018, commented, “Having the opportunity to hear Eva’s testimony firsthand was such a privilege. The entire experience of visiting Auschwitz with the Maimonides Institute for Medicine, Ethics and the Holocaust and Eva Mozes Kor made me realize the importance of being an active agent of social change and fighting for equality, dignity and justice for all people.” Gallin and Grady started College Athletes for Respect and Equality (CARE), a social justice initiative, as a result of their 2018 trip.
For more information visit www.mimeh.org.
