http://www.theage.com.au/world/angel-of-death-left-man-with-one-kidney-20091211-kois.htmlHEART specialists have saved the life of an Israeli man who refused to visit a doctor for 64 years - and learnt the terrible secret of his mistrust of the medical profession. When Yitzchak Ganon, 85, awoke from the anaesthetic at a hospital near Tel Aviv, he was informed he had only one kidney.''I know,'' he said. ''The last time I saw the other one, it was pulsating in the hand of a man called Josef Mengele. He was a doctor too.''Mr Ganon revealed to his family why he had never visited a doctor since he was freed from the Auschwitz death camp in January 1945.A Greek Jew, he was deported along with his mother, father and five brothers and sisters to Auschwitz in 1944. His father died en route, and his mother and siblings were gassed within hours of their arrival. But he was chosen by Mengele, the infamous Nazi doctor who met every transport that arrived in search of human guinea pigs.Mengele, known to his victims as the Angel of Death, had him strapped to an operating table.''He cut into me, without narcotics,'' said Mr Ganon. ''The pain was indescribable. I felt every slice of the knife. Then I saw my kidney pulsating in his hand. I cried like a madman, I cried out the prayer, 'Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is one…'''And I prayed to die, that I might not suffer this agony any more.''But Mengele, whose quest was to eventually clone perfect Nazi supermen for Adolf Hitler, had not finished with him.''After the operation, I was given no painkillers and put to work,'' he said. ''I cleaned up after the other bloody operations carried out by Mengele.''Six months later, the Angel of Death called for him again. He was immersed in a tub of freezing water and intermittently inspected by Mengele, who said he wanted to check how Mr Ganon's lungs were functioning.''Then I was selected for gassing because my body was no longer any use to them,'' he said. He was the 201st man sent to the gas chambers one morning - but it was full after 200. ''That saved my life. I was then sent back to the camp.''He returned to Greece when Auschwitz was liberated, was reunited with a brother and sister who survived the Nazi round-ups, and emigrated to Israel in 1949.His family were puzzled about his reluctance to see doctors down the years. Every cold, infection, bruise, cut and sickness he encountered, he dealt with himself.His wife, Ahuva, said: ''Whenever he was sick, he would deny it, claiming he was just tired.''Then came the heart attack a month ago and the enforced visit that revealed the secret he had carried around for so long.Now with a pacemaker in his heart, he says: ''I guess I cheated death a second time. But this time it was doctors helping me instead of the other way round.''Mengele escaped after the war to South America and was supported by his wealthy family and old Nazi comrades for many years before he drowned in Brazil in 1979 after suffering a massive stroke while swimming.
