23,000 Jews Remain in Theresienstadt; Jews from Germany Do Not Want to Return Home

About 8,000 Jews have left this ghetto city since their liberation by the Red Army, but 23,000 still remain confined here. of these, one out of four have been hospitalized. Despite semi-official statements that the typhus apidemic has been halted, the number of cases has risen until now about 2,300 are affected. Among the seriously ill is Dr. Franticek Friedman, former head of the Prague Jewish community.

Although the typhus is not of the severe type, the under-fed condition of the internees is resulting in many fatalities. The Russians have moved in five hospital units, which are working excellently, but the nursing shortage continues. Although the epidemic is believed to be under control, Czech public health physicians are stymied in the use of DDT powder, of which they have plenty, by the lack of spray guns. They have improvised some sort of shakers.

Of the Jews remaining in the camp, 8,000 are from Hungary, over 4,000 are from Poland, 1,300 are Netherlanders, another 1,300 are Austrians, 6,000 are Germans, 2,500 are Czechs and there are a few hundred Frenchmen.

Robert Prochnik, the secretary of the Jewish community in Theresienstadt, told a Jewish Telegraphic Agency correspondent that the surviving Germans are mainly elderly, and almost all of them have children outside of Europe. He said that they should be allowed to emigrate, as "they will die from heartbreak" if they are sent back to Germany. The Poles also could not endure being returned to the land where their families were exterminated, he said.

The camp had 1,600 children, rather than 400 as originally estimated, but most of these have already returned home with their Czech parents. It is thought that the remaining 500, including 120 orphans from Poland, may be placed in a Prague orphan asylum, as the Czech Government desires to close down the camp.