It is tragic and unacceptable that half of all Holocaust survivors worldwide, including tens of thousands in the United States, are living today in or near the poverty line, unable to afford even the basic requirements for a dignified old age such as home care, medicines, mental health care, eyeglasses, dental care, hearing aids, food, rent, and other vital services.   

Further, because of the savage actions of the Nazi German regime, with the death camps, the labor camps, medical experiments, torture, starvation, and death marches, Holocaust survivors’ mental and physical health care needs are more extensive, more complex, and more dire than other elderly people, and require serious, comprehensive care.    

German Chancellor Adenauer recognized modern Germany’s responsibility to take care of all the needs of living survivors “to their last breath.”  Unfortunately, this promise has not been fulfilled.   

\With so little time remaining in the lives of survivors, and so much suffering, we join with Holocaust survivor leaders in urging Chancellor Merkel, the German government, and the German people to provide all of the funding necessary to provide  required health care and income needs of the survivors for the rest of their lives however long that may be so they can live in peace finally.