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In 1940-1945, after the German annexation of the Bohemian, Moravian and Silesian borderland areas,the Nazi eugenic/racial hygiene laws were extended to cover the annexed territory, and the process was facilitated to a great extent by the ideologisation of social and healthcare that had been occurring in the Sudeten areas in the preceding period. From the 1st of January 1940 to the 4th of May 1945 the GeVeN was in force including pursuant executive regulations, i.e. steri- lisations and terminations of pregnancy for eugenic purposes were in this period legal. Surgical operations of this kind could be carried out in a total of twenty-one hospital facilities, namely in the towns of Aš, Sokolov, Mariánské Lázně, Karlovy Vary, Cheb, Most, Liberec, Teplice, Ústí nad Labem, Děčín, Česká Lípa, Varns- dorf, Jablonec nad Nisou, Trutnov, Tanvald, Vrchlabí, Litoměřice, Cvikov, Opava, Šternberk na Moravě, and Krnov. According to sources known and accessible to date, the overall number of sterilisations carried out in the so-called Sudeten Reichgau was in the thousands, but probably no more than 3,000. It is evident that there were variations in the frequency of these operations both by region and over time, and these remain a theme for further research. Similarly, new studies will be needed to identify the social stratification and diagnoses of the subjects of the surgery |
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