Our prescription for survival
The following statement was delivered by Walusungu Mtonga and Stella Ziegler, IPPNW’s International Student Representatives, to the General Debate of the third Meeting of States Parties to the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW). United Nations Headquarters, NYC | 5 March 2025.
Distinguished delegates, esteemed colleagues, and honored guests,
We stand before you today as Board Members of the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW), a global network of health professionals united in the mission to prevent nuclear war and safeguard human and planetary health. We are medical students and members of the generation that is rising up to reject the deadly inheritance of nuclear weapons.
Read more…Two different American approaches to the world
The recent whirlwind of Trump administration foreign policy measures―many reversing those of the Biden administration―illustrates the fact that Americans have sharply different opinions about their relationship to other nations.
Read more…We helped people grasp what a nuclear war would really be like
[On January 28, Dr. Eric Chivian, one of IPPNW’s founders in the 1960s, spoke at Harvard University’s Countway Library at an event entitled “Prescriptions for Peace: Physician Activism in the Nuclear Age, 1961-1985.” The event accompanied the launch of the Center for the History of Medicine’s “Prescriptions for Peace” exhibition on physician anti-nuclear activism, 1961-1985. The audience also heard from Harvard Medical School student Katie Blanton, MSc, whose undergraduate thesis, “The doomsday doctors: medical activism in the nuclear age, 1960–2000,” won Harvard’s Thomas Temple Hoopes Prize for outstanding scholarly research and excellence in the art of teaching.]
In the early 1960s, when Physicians for Social Responsibility was born, there was already a strong anti-nuclear movement in the US, organized by such groups as SANE Nuclear Policy, the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, and many others. Leading scientists like Linus Pauling and many of those who helped make the first nuclear weapons–Leo Szilard, Bernie Feld, Phil Morrison, Vicky Weisskopf, and many others were also deeply involved. I was very lucky to have known Bernie, Phil, and Vicky well.
These efforts were successful in many ways, but what physicians in PSR and IPPNW were able to do that these efforts were not able to accomplish, was that we helped people grasp what a nuclear war would really be like, so that they knew that these weapons were so catastrophically destructive that they could never be used in wartime, that it was a dangerous illusion to believe that civil defense was possible, that there could be any effective medical response whatsoever for the survivors, and that humanity could ever recover from a nuclear war.
Read more…The Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons provides a way to avert nuclear catastrophe
Will the world ever be free of the menace of nuclear annihilation?
There was a promising start along these lines during the late twentieth century, when―pressed by a popular upsurge against nuclear weapons―the nations of the world adopted a succession of nuclear arms control and disarmament agreements. Starting with the Partial Test Ban Treaty of 1963, these agreements helped curb the nuclear arms race and prevent nuclear war.
Read more…IPPNW action at COP29 for disarmament, climate justice and health
For the 29th UN climate conference (COP29) in Baku, Azerbaijan, IPPNW and its UK affiliate, Medact, sent official delegations to highlight human and environmental health. The IPPNW team emphasized that the climate crisis, militarisation, and nuclear weapons pose a severe threat to global health, stressed that the climate crisis exacerbates conflict and inequality, and called for addressing fossil-fuel dependence and militarisation through peace action, press conference and advocacy at COP29.
Read more…Resistance to the International Criminal Court by the world’s most powerful nations
The International Criminal Court’s recent issuance of arrest warrants to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for crimes against humanity and war crimes in Gaza has stirred up a considerable backlash. Dismissing the charges as “absurd and false,” Netanyahu announced that Israel would “not recognize the validity” of the ICC’s action. US President Joe Biden denounced the arrest warrants as “outrageous,” while the French government, after agreeing to support them, reversed its stance.
Read more…A government for the world
Donald Trump’s latest rollout of his hyper nationalist “America First” policy underscores the world’s long-term slide toward catastrophe.
Within nations, when conflicts inevitably erupt, there are laws, as well as police, courts, and governments that enforce the laws.
On the global level, however, the situation approaches international anarchy. Although the United Nations, the International Court of Justice, and the International Criminal Court sort out the issues, they are relatively powerless when major crises occur. They issue laudable statements based on international law, while the most powerful nations frequently defy them and go on their merry, marauding way.
Read more…
“I don’t see a pandemic finishing us off, and climate change itself would (to quote Keating) ‘do us slowly’. The one sure path to extinction is nuclear war.” – Professor Peter Doherty AC, Nobel Laureate, communication to the author, 9 Sep 2024.
Two days after Donald Trump’s election last week, the European Union’s Copernicus Climate Change Service reported that this year will be the warmest on record and the first year more than 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels, likely more than 1.55°C above. Yet exactly when global leadership on climate action is needed most, the world’s second-largest emitter has a climate-denying, corrupt, criminal president-elect with no regard for facts, committed to leaving the Paris Agreement and ramping up fossil fuel extraction and use.
Read more…From national security to international security
Have human institutions evolved sufficiently to cope with the modern world? When it comes to national security, the answer appears to be: No.
Ever since the emergence of individual nations, their governments have sought to secure what they consider their “interests” on an ungoverned planet of competing nations. Amid this international free-for-all, nations tended to pursue national security or national advantage through military might.
Read more…The US has abandoned the Marshallese people
by Christopher Serrao
I encourage all of you to think about what it was truly like in the Marshall Islands on March 1, 1954. Imagine living in the tropical islands replete with diverse flora and fauna. Suddenly, a massive flash is followed by a hot gust of wind and a deafening explosion. Hours later, a powdery white substance rains down from the sky, causing people’s skin to burn and peel off, inducing vomiting, diarrhea, hair loss, and a plethora of diseases down the line. This was the experience of the people of Rongelap and Ailinginae during Castle Bravo.
Many Bikinians present at the first test still recall a promise by US Commodore Ben Wyatt. He told them, “No matter if the Bikinians found themselves on a sandbar or adrift on a raft at sea, they would be taken care of as if they were the children of America.” The US has abandoned this promise, and in doing so the Marshallese people. The whole of the Marshall Islands were contaminated by radiation from 67 nuclear tests equivalent to more than 7200 Hiroshima bombs.
We urge the Human Rights Council to approve and implement the recommendations of the High Commissioner’s report. We call upon the US to pay the compensation claims requested by the people of RMI and to release all pertinent data to the Marshallese government and the public. We also entreat all those within the international sphere to support the implementation of the Marshallese transitional justice work. We urge all Member States to join the TPNW.
Christopher Serrao, a graduate of Exeter Academy who is using part of his gap year before college to assist IPPNW in its Geneva Liaison Office, presented the above testimony to the the UN Human Rights Council on 4 October. The Council was addressing Resolution 51/35 — “Technical assistance and capacity-building to address the human rights implications of the nuclear legacy in the Marshall Islands.”
Bimal Khadka
Bjorn Hilt
Charles K. Johnson
Gunnar Westberg
IPPNW
John Loretz
Lawrence Wittner
Maria Valenti
mollymcgint
Sue Wareham
Tilman Ruff
Tim Wright
Xanthe Hall
IPPNW peace and health blog 