Refugee Medical Labor in Sweden after the Second World War

Description

At the outbreak of the Second World War, the Swedish government and medical profession were resistant to employing foreign medical professionals fleeing Nazi persecution, particularly German Jewish doctors. The mood changed during the war, when an influx of, among others, Baltic refugees made it all but essential to do so. When the war ended and some 30,000 liberated concentration camp prisoners and others from around Europe who suffered under the Nazis came to Sweden as repatriates, the Swedish government had little choice but to employ these new refugees as medical professionals as well. In our presentation, we consider one and possibly two postwar refugee camps in Sweden where foreign doctors who were refugees were employed as a case study of how forced migration in the aftermath of the Second World War created both challenges and solutions to medical care in a time of crisis. While previous research has investigated how Second World War refugees were employed as agricultural laborers and archive workers to fill labor market demands in Sweden, our research sheds new light on health and medicine challenges in Sweden during the early postwar period and adds new understanding to how foreign medical professionals played an important role during this period.

Period	2025 Apr 24
Event title	Nordic Medical History Congress
Event type	Conference
Location	Lund, SwedenShow on map
Degree of Recognition	International