Dr. Michael A. Dworkind

Ottawa, April 17, 2009

International Physician Advocacy

In 1987 the World Health Organization concluded that nuclear weapons “constitute the greatest immediate threat to health and human survival . . . and that the only approach to the treatment of the health effects of nuclear warfare is primary prevention, that is, the prevention of nuclear war.” More than two decades later, the nuclear threat not only persists but is in many ways more dangerous than ever before.

What is International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW)?

IPPNW is the only international medical organization dedicated to the abolition of nuclear weapons. Founded by US and Russian physicians in 1980, IPPNW is credited with raising public awareness about the devastating effects of nuclear weapons and with persuading American and Soviet leaders that the Cold War nuclear arms race was jeopardizing the survival of the entire world. IPPNW received the 1985 Nobel Peace Prize in recognition of this accomplishment.

In December, IPPNW receives the 1985 Nobel Peace Prize in Oslo. The Nobel Peace Committee commends

IPPNW for “considerable service to mankind by spreading authoritative information and in creating an awareness of the catastrophic consequences of atomic welfare.”

In the 1960’s, a group of concerned physicians studied and documented the blast, heat, and radiation effects of nuclear weapons, and came to the inescapable conclusion that a meaningful medical response to nuclear war is impossible.

The atomic destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the lifelong suffering of the survivors – the result of only two, small, relatively primitive nuclear weapons – had put the medical profession on notice that it must prevent what it would be unable to cure.

IPPNW believes that nuclear weapons are incompatible with human survival, and that no country is entitled to possess them as a matter of international law-a principle that was affirmed by the International Court of Justice in 1996.

IPPNW holds every nuclear weapon state-and any state that might consider acquiring nuclear weapons-to a single standard: no one is justified in having, developing, or using nuclear weapons for any reason.

Why nuclear weapons?

Isn’t all war destructive?

• Only nuclear weapons can kill tens of hundreds of thousands of people with a single explosion, in a matter of moments.

• Only nuclear weapons produce radioactive fallout that can cause cancers, birth defects, and genetic damage for decades after they are used.

• Only nuclear weapons, used in sufficient numbers, could cause a nuclear winter effectively ending human life on Earth.

Almost two decades after the Cold War,

why should we still be worried about

nuclear weapons?

• Some 25,000 nuclear weapons remain in the arsenals of the nuclear powers-more than 95 percent of them in the US and Russia-with an explosive yield of more than a hundred thousand Hiroshima-sized bombs.

• The US and Russia maintain thousands of nuclear weapons on constant alert, ready to be launched at a moment’s notice.

• China, France, the United Kingdom, Israel, India, Pakistan, and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (North Korea), also have nuclear weapons.

• Other countries have gone part way toward developing nuclear weapons in recent years but have stopped, while the intentions of some, such as Iran, are still uncertain.

• The sizes of existing nuclear arsenals and the possible unraveling of the non-proliferation regime are worrisome, but so are changing nuclear weapons policies, which are increasing the risk that these weapons may actually be used.

• The US, France, and the UK are all developing new generations of smaller, more flexible nuclear weapons and have described uses for them that go beyond deterring the use of nuclear weapons by others.

• Indian and Pakistan have engaged in nuclear rhetoric reminiscent of that used by the US and the Soviet Union during the Cold War, and there are legitimate concerns that the nuclear line could be crossed in the Middle East.

Add to that the growing threat of nuclear terrorism, and it becomes clear that our post-Cold War nuclear danger is not only very real but also far more complex than it was in the days of “mutually assured destruction.”

Who are IPPNW affiliates?

IPPNW affiliates are national medical organizations with a common commitment to the abolition of nuclear weapons and the prevention of war. IPPNW had 60 affiliates in 59 countries, with several other groups in formation.

A BRIEF HISTORY

Founded in 1980, IPPNW was an inspiration born of the Cold War. With the world divided into two militarized camps poised on the brink of nuclear war, a small group of Soviet and American doctors took a leap of faith. They reasoned that their common interest in survival was more powerful than the ideological divides between them. They believed that their obligation as physicians included a common commitment to the prevention of nuclear war.

Led by co-founders Drs. Bernard Lown of the U.S. and Evgueni Chazov of the Soviet Union, they organized a team to conduct meticulous scientific research based on data collected by Japanese colleagues who had studied the effects of the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. And they drew upon their knowledge of the medical effects of burn, blast, and radiation injuries.

The doctors sounded a medical warning to humanity: that nuclear war would be the final epidemic; that there would be no cure and no meaningful medical response. Their message reached millions of people around the world.

IPPNW and its affiliates not only educated the public, they also organized citizens in the nuclear states to protest and change their governments’ policies. IPPNW believes that the active involvement of millions of people is essential if we are to prevent war and abolish nuclear weapons.

Physician activists were instrumental in the campaigns to ban atmospheric and underground nuclear test explosions and in helping to shut down nuclear weapons testing sites and production facilities.

As the Cold War came to an end, IPPNW had grown to comprise some 200,000 physicians, health care workers, and concerned citizens every region of the world.

MILESTONES

1st World Congress - Airlie, Virginia (1981)

2nd World Congress - Cambridge, UK (1982)

3rd World Congress - Espoo, Finland (1984)

8th World Congress - Montreal, Canada (1988)

10th World Congress - Stockholm, Sweden (1991)

11th World Congress - Mexico City (1993)

14th World Congress - Paris, France (2000)

15th World Congress - Washington, DC, U.S. (2002)

16th World Congress - Beijing, China (2004)

17th World Congress - Helsinki, Finland (2006)

18th World Congress - Delhi, India (2008)

1988

IPPNW co-sponsors the International Scientific Symposium on a Nuclear Test Ban in Las Vegas, Nevada. The Soviet Union conducts the first nuclear test of 1988, triggering protests from IPPNW affiliates as part of the new Cease-Fire campaign. Affiliates continue to protest every single nuclear test.

The Eighth World Congress is held in Montreal, Canada, and is attended by 2,500 physicians from nearly 80 countries.

Crosby, Stills and Nash and Bruce Cockburn, together with musicians from the USSR and Canada perform at IPPNW’s Concert for Peace. IPPNW’s Concert Tour for Peace begins in Berlin (West).

In response to a growing crisis created by nuclear weapon manufacture, IPPNW creates the International Commission to Investigate the Health and Environmental Effects of Nuclear Weapons Production.

1989

SatelLife is incorporated under the auspices of IPPNW to develop programs using space technology for medical purpose with an emphasis on the developing world.

1990

IPPNW convenes the International Citizens Congress for a Nuclear Test Ban in Alma-Ata and Semipalatinsk, USSR. The historic event revitalizes the Comprehensive Test Ban campaign. SatelLife plans next year’s launch that would provide vital information services to medical communities in the developing world.

1992

The World Court Project is launched in conjunction with the International Peace Bureau and the International Association of Lawyers Against Nuclear Arms. The goal of the project is to have the International Court of Justice issue an advisory opinion on the illegality of nuclear weapons.

1994The United Nations General Assembly request an advisory opinion from the World Court on the legality of the threat or use of nuclear weapons; 34 national governments submit legal arguments to the Court.

IPPNW joins in presenting 110 million citizens’ signatures to the Court in opposition to nuclear weapons.

The Abolition 2000 campaign is launched with the goal of building worldwide support for a signed global agreement by the year 2000 that sets a firm timetable for nuclear abolition.

An unprecedented tour by Russian Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (RPPNW) to four principal nuclear weapons sites in the US takes place as part of RPPNW’s continuing public education campaign on the nuclear threat.

1997

IPPNW produces the comprehensive report Landmines: A Global Health Crisis, the second in the Global Health Watch series.

Medicine & Global Survival and Medicine, Conflict and Survival are designated IPPNW journals.

1999Security and Survival: The Case for a Nuclear Weapons Convention is produced by IPPNW in cooperation with the Lawyers Committee for Nuclear Policy and the International Network of Engineers and Scientists Against Proliferation. The book, released at the UN during the Non-Proliferation Treaty PrepCom, is a valuable organizing tool in the campaign for nuclear abolition.

2000

Thousands of IPPNW physicians and supporters campaign against US plans to deploy a national missile defence system that threatens to overturn the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty and ignite a new nuclear arms race.

“Aiming For Prevention,” IPPNW’s international medical conference on small arms, gun violence, and injury, took place in Helsinki in

September and marked the official launch of a global campaign on the medical and public health effects of the small arms pandemic.

2001

Today IPPNW mobilizes doctors, medical students, and concerned citizens in 62 countries in the service of a broader war prevention mission. The International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) and Aiming For Prevention, IPPNW’s campaign to reduce the global devastation caused by small arms violence, bring the expertise and compassion of doctors to bear on the whole human tragedy of armed conflict.

UPCOMINGWORLD CONGRESSES

IPPNW World Congresses are held every two years.

The 19th World Congress will be held in the Swiss city of Basel from August 25-30, 2010.

Congress website: www.ippnw2010.org

PUBLICATIONS

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