TRAGEDY

U.S. Lobotomized 2,000 Veterans

Due to mental illness in WWII.

Both during and after World War II, the U.S. government lobotomized around 2,000 troops deemed mentally ill. Those operated on were diagnosed as depressive, psychotic, schizophrenic, and sometimes homosexual. The operations took place in VA hospitals across the country, including Oregon, Massachusetts, Alabama, and South Dakota. Knowledge of the widespread practice by the VA has faded with time, and the department says it currently has no record how the policy was started and how big the program became. While some were helped by the surgery, more often it left the patients with terrible side-effects, with some even dying.