Canada:  Asperger’s links to Nazis causes society to consider name change

Shocking new revelations that the namesake of Asperger’s syndrome was an accomplice to the Nazi murder of children has spurred the Asperger’s Society of Ontario (ASO) to considering changing its name, but it is encountering resistance.

Detailed information that has come to light over the past few months about Dr. Hans Asperger has “certainly raised red flags both within our community and with the Asperger’s Society of Ontario board of directors,” the organization said in a statement to The CJN.

The ASO is “in the process of considering our options in this regard and will let our constituents know once we’ve made a decision. “We do not want to be aligned with someone associated with the Nazi regime.”

But a decision to rebrand “cannot be taken lightly and requires the development of a strategy that incorporates discussion and consultation with our community and experts in this field.”

Asperger’s syndrome has long been considered a mild form of autism. In 2013, the name was dropped from the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual, Fifth Edition (DSM-5) and is now defined as autism spectrum disorder, or ASD.

However, “many in our community have not embraced the change,” the ASO noted in its statement, adding that when the DSM-5 was published, the society made “a strategic decision” not to rebrand, partly because awareness of Asperger’s syndrome had become “much more mainstream” thanks to public education, and also “since it was increasingly becoming part of popular culture.”

The controversy surrounding Asperger, an Austrian pediatrician and professor, surfaced some years ago, but found new traction this spring, following the publication of a story in the New York Times by Edith Sheffer of the Institute of European Studies at the University of California, Berkeley, and of a study in the journal Molecular Autism by Herwig Czech, an expert in the history of medicine at the University of Vienna.

They revealed that in Vienna, following the absorption of Austria into the Third Reich in 1938, Asperger co-operated with the Nazi regime and was rewarded for his loyalty with career opportunities.

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