BIIa
(German: Bauabschnitt IIa – construction segment 2, sector a)
One of the nine camps built by the Germans in Birkenau and one of three men's camps. It numbered 19 wooden barracks, three of which functioned as latrines and washrooms, with the other 16 serving as residential barracks. It was established in August 1943, a month after the opening of the BII d men’s camp. It held prisoners undergoing entry quarantine, which usually lasted three to four weeks.
Camp population underwent frequent fluctuations: at first, it held more than 7,000 prisoners, but in the spring of 1944 there were times when this figure fell below one thousand. From April, it was also used for exhausted prisoners arriving in evacuation transports from Majdanek, and later for other sick prisoners.
The quarantine camp was liquidated at the beginning of November 1944, with the healthy prisoners transferred to sector BII d and the sick to the BII f camp hospital.