Nuclear Weapons: The Final PandemicPreventing Proliferation and Achieving Abolition

Medicine and Nuclear War

Victor W. Sidel

Distinguished University Professor of Social MedicineMontefiore Medical Center and Albert Einstein College of Medicine

Medicine and Nuclear War

Victor W. Sidel, MDFormer Co-President, IPPNW

Distinguished University Professor of Social MedicineMontefiore Medical Center and Albert Einstein College of Medicine

Adjunct Professor of Public HealthWeill Medical College of Cornell University

Prepared for the International Conference on Nuclear Weapons Sponsored by the Royal Society of Medicine and IPPNW

London -- October 3, 2007

Nation-States Possessing Nuclear Weapons in 2007

Nuclear Weapons -Declared States

USA 4530 780 5000 10,310

Russia 3800 3400 11000 18,200

France 290 60 350

China 400 150 550

Britain 185 15 200

Strategic Tactical Reserve Total

Nation-States With Declared Nuclear Weapons

Nation-States With De Facto States

Israel – 75-200

India – 40-50

Pakistan – 25-50

North Korea - ?

Nation-States With De Facto Nuclear Weapons

Nuclear Weapons Today

• 27,000 nuclear warheads with the equivalent explosive force of:– Over 200,000 Hiroshima-sized bombs.– 10 billion tons of TNT, 2 tons for every

human on the planet.

• 2,000-3,000 on hair-trigger alert, ready to be launched on a few minutes notice.

Nuclear Posture Review Bush Administration’s 2002 Nuclear Posture Review

asserts a permanent role for nuclear weapons into the future

Russia and China remain targets and 5 other countries are listed as potential targets of US nuclear weapons: Iran, Iraq, Libya, North Korea, Syria

Reshapes arsenal from one intended mainly for deterrence to one for nuclear war-fighting and distinction between nuclear and non-nuclear missions and weapons becomes blurred.

Nuclear Weapons Convention (NWC)

A model NWC – a convention to to ban the development, possession, and use of nuclear weapons, much like the conventions on biological and chemical weapons – was drafted in 1996 by an international consortium of lawyers, scientists, and disarmament experts and was submitted by Costa Rica to the United Nations. It became a formal UN document, available in the six official UN languages. In 1997, the United Nations General Assembly called for negotiations leading to the conclusion of a NWC.

International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN)

ICAN was launched by IPPNW in 2007 to urge negotiation of a nuclear weapons convention. The campaign focuses on the nuclear-weapons states’ stockpiles of nuclear weapons, which risk their use by design, accident, or terrorism, and are a continued instigation for others to develop nuclear weapons capabilities. In order to reduce the probability of the use of nuclear weapons, ICAN also urges that existing weapons be taken off high alert and that nuclear-weapons states commit themselves to a “no first-use” policy.