Henry Ascher – With compassion for those in need

NEW PROFESSOR.Experiences from the Holocaust are general and not just about Jews. This was made clear to Henry Ascher at an early age by his grandparents.
“Strange as it may seem it took quite some time before I realised that my commitment to human rights stems from exactly this, that my parents came here as refugees and that their families were wiped out during the war.”

We have arranged a meeting at Angered hospital, where Henry Ascher, professor of public health, works as a senior doctor in paediatrics. He explains that this hospital, which opened in 2015, is unique in the world.
“It was created to equalise the great unevenness in the health of the people of Gothenburg. Those in the north east suffer to a much greater extent than the rest of the city from cardiovascular disease, COPD, lung cancer and obesity, among other things. The unusual thing is that the hospital was created as a collaboration between patients and staff. For example, when the building was planned, meetings were organised with residents and fliers were given out at tram stops so as to obtain people’s views, which led among other things to a large reception room with space for family members and interpreters.”

the number of two year olds with coeliac disease had actually tripled

This hospital is also special because part of its task is to promote health. One example is the Take along a friend project, is which screening for cervical cancer increased after women were encouraged to take a friend along to the examination. Suitable residents have also been trained to be health informers, a kind of link between citizens and health care. All activities are based on the idea that the patients have a right to health and the staff have an obligation to fulfil that right.
Henry Ascher combines work at the hospital with research into migration and health, especially among families and children. But his doctoral thesis of 1996 was about something quite different.
“There had been studies in the United Kingdom showing a great reduction in coeliac disease, something that did not agree with what we found in Sweden. So I was tasked with performing an epidemiological study and found that the number of two year olds with coeliac disease had actually tripled in three to four years. I attempted to understand the causes of this in my thesis, through dietary studies and genetic surveys among other things. I found that the baby food industry had increased the gluten content of porridge and gruel. But whether this led to more children becoming ill or whether it was that those who were ill become so ill from it that the disease was discovered earlier and could be treated was uncertain. There was much to indicate the latter and that it is probably advantageous to start treatment early so as to prevent complications and resultant illnesses.”

It was shocking to me that there were paperless people

Henry Ascher devotes one day a week to the Refugee Children Team in Gothenburg, which is a unit of Angered hospital. And refugee children are something he has become an expert in. He has gained his knowledge from being thrown into situations that he knew very little about to begin with. In 1998 for example when he was contacted by Anita Dorazio, who had started a clinic for paperless refugees in Stockholm, at first Henry Ascher did not really understand what she was talking about.
“It was shocking to me that there were paperless people in Sweden, and even more shocking that it was not taken for granted that they had the right to health care according to their medical needs. Anita convinced me and some friends that we needed a clinic in Gothenburg too, so we got a number of people together and started the Rosengrenska foundation. We had three goals: provide health care, increase knowledge about paperless people, both among ourselves and in society at large, and convince normal health care to take over so that we could close down. It wasn’t difficult to get paediatric clinicians involved, but it took a long time to get the idea through that paperless adults should also have the right to health care.”
Only on 1 July 2013 did legislation arrive that gave the paperless the inalienable right to health care.
“There is no clear definition however of what is meant by this. At Angered hospital we interpret this to mean that even those who do not have the right to remain in the country still have human rights, which include the right to health care when they are ill.”

In 2004 Henry Ascher became a lecturer in children’s and young persons’ health at the Nordic School of Public Health. He left Queen Silvia Children’s Hospital after 20 years and started work at the paediatric clinic in Hammarkullen, which later became part of the paediatric clinic in Gamlestaden. There, as well as through the Swedish Paediatric Society’s working group for refugee children, he came into contact with apathetic refugee children. That was at the time when applications for residence permits rose to such an extent that in the winter of 2005–2006 the Swedish government pushed through a temporary law that gave more asylum seekers the opportunity to stay.
However, Henry Ascher’s commitment has also caused feelings to run high. In 2010 and 2011, when he was a doctor on board the Ship to Gaza, a number of Jewish organisations were strongly critical.

a real trip down the social scale

“It was as though I was looked on as some kind of traitor. But it was not in spite of my Jewish background that I became committed to the Palestinians, on the contrary it was because of it.”
It was his maternal grandparents who explained that the lesson we must all learn from the Holocaust is not just about Jews, it is about racism and human rights in general.
“My grandparents left Berlin together with their family as early as 1933, when my mother was twelve years old. How they could already have known what Nazi Germany was heading towards is something I have never entirely worked out. But to enable his daughters to continue to go to school, my grandfather had to show papers to prove that he had served in the first world war, and perhaps it was the risk that his children would not be able to get an education, together with a habit of travelling, that meant that he decided to leave Germany in such good time. However life in Sweden meant a real trip down the social scale. The family had been among the upper classes in Berlin, but in Stockholm the six of them lived in a three room apartment in the only apartment block in Lidingö.

We need brave politicians

Henry Ascher’s father came from much more modest circumstances. In 1939, as an 18 year old, he received a grant to travel from Austria to Sweden. His cousin had been sent to England a year previously at the age of nine as part of the Kindertransport.
“My father almost never spoke about his childhood. Only when he did not have long to live did he talk about a folder full of all the letters he had kept from when he was trying to persuade the Swedish authorities to give an entry permit for the family. My father and his cousin were the only ones on my father’s side who survived the war.”
How should we understand the Holocaust? That is a question that gives Henry Ascher no peace.
“The medical profession was one of the groups in Germany that had most members of the Nazi party. How is that possible? One answer is the Star of David that so clearly differentiated one part of society form another. Another answer comes from Oskar Gröning, the last concentration camp guard to be found and tried, who explained his actions with “the comfort of allegiance”: you do what all the others do, and don’t think about how what is normal is being insidiously changed and gradually becomes something you should never accept.”
Sweden can hardly solve the present catastrophic refugee situation alone. But Henry Ascher believes that we could at least take better care of the knowledge and experience that exist.
“When refugee children come here they get a fantastic reception. But when they reach 18, all the support suddenly ends. They are thrown out of their accommodation and lose their legal representatives. Many become homeless but still stay close to their school, the only safe place in their existence. In putting these young people into an impossible situation, society is supporting organised crime, because how else could they manage? We need brave politicians who stand up for the humane values that are part of the Swedish and who listen to the research that exists. And we must be more humble and admit that the decisions we take sometimes go completely the wrong way.”

Henry Ascher’s commitment to children has also led to a task that is entirely enjoyable.
“I am a member of the jury for the Alma Award, the world’s biggest award for children’s and young persons’ literature. This year we had 235 nominations from 60 countries. This assignment means that I must read a huge amount of children’s and young persons’ literature, which forces me to conclude things that I would otherwise have been working too much on; I feel highly honoured to be part of it.”

THE TEXT WAS FIRST PUBLISHED IN GU JOURNALEN 2/2028.

TEXT: EVA LUNDGREN
PHOTO: JOHAN WINGBORG