Deaf People in Hitler's Europe
 The Nazi campaign against the handicapped began on July 14, 1933 with the Law for the Prevention of Genetically Diseased Offspring. The Nazis sterilized people with disabilities such as mental illness, retardation, blindness, and deaf people. It was justified by scientists and the doctors who certified patients conditions as hereditary in order to prevent such handicapped people from bearing children. Teachers and others were involved in the certification process. 375,000 people were sterilized by force and an estimated 17,000 of the people sterilized were deaf. Later Action T4 killed thousands of people who were "judged incurably sick, by critical medical examination" from 1939-41 officially and up to 1945 unofficially.