Physicians for Social Responsibility PA Shistory of Accomplishmentsr
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Physicians for Social Responsibility PA SHistory of AccomplishmentsR PSR Greeley, Colorado Tribune The A History of Accomplishments Photo by Travis Spradling, reprinted withof permission Spradling, reprinted Travis Photo by INTRODUCTION 3 NUCLEAR DISARMAMENT 4 ENVIRONMENT & HEALTH 11 VIOLENCE PREVENTION 17 INSIDE COVER & ABOVE: PAPER LANTERNS FLOAT DOWNSTREAM IN ONE OF DOZENS OF HIROSHIMA DAY EVENTS ORGANIZED BY PSR CHAPTERS IN 1987 TO COMMEMORATE THOSE WHO DIED AND TO REKINDLE HOPE FOR A WORLD WITHOUT NUCLEAR ARMS. PSR CO-FOUNDERS (FROM LEFT) DRS. H. JACK GEIGER, VICTOR SIDEL, AND SIDNEY ALEXANDER POSE WITH THE 1985 NOBEL PEACE PRIZE IN OSLO. 2 PSR began in 1961 with one major goal: to educate the medical profession and the world about the dangers of nuclear weapons. We created an organiza- tion that could be trusted to speak the truth and to serve as an credible resource for all who cared about the survival of the planet. We grew into a national organization with local and medical student chapters, and became part of a global network of physicians groups, International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW), founded on PSR’s model. The efforts of this campaign to reverse the nuclear arms race were recognized in 1985 with the Nobel Prize for Peace. Over the past decade, we have built on our record of achievement by stalling nuclear warhead production and winning a comprehensive ban on all nuclear tests. At the same time, PSR’s mission has expanded to meet the challenges that face us with the new century. Recognizing that other dangers to human health now loom as large as the nuclear threat, we have CHRISTINE CASSEL, broadened our agenda to address global climate change, toxic pollution, and gun MD, SHARES A violence. Our early victories include passing safe drinking water and pesticide MOMENT WITH reform legislation and saving the ban on assault weapons. CHICAGO MAYOR PSR’s national leaders and local chapters now speak on behalf of 18,000 HAROLD members, bringing a powerful and scientifically respected message to policy mak- WASHINGTON ers and the public. Our accomplishments over the last four decades—in public AT PSR’S 1987 and professional education, research, and national and international policy— NATIONAL attest to the enduring effectiveness of PSR’s vision of physician activism. MEETING. MUSICIAN GRAHAM NASH JOINS PSR AND IPPNW CO- FOUNDER BERNARD LOWN, MD, ON A PANEL AT IPPNW’S 1988 WORLD CONGRESS IN MONTREAL. 3 Nuclear Disarmament New England Journal Articles and for the Limited Test Ban Treaty, which Within a year of the organization’s ended above-ground nuclear tests by the founding, PSR physicians published a US, the USSR, and Britain in 1963. series of articles in the New England Jour- nal of Medicine detailing the catastrophic The Bombing Runs consequences of a thermonuclear war involving the US. The articles mapped When nuclear stockpiles hit an all-time out the potential human and ecological ef- high in the 1980s, a newly revitalized PSR, fects of a nuclear blast and the inadequacy led by Helen Caldicott, MD, organized of any medical response, thus refuting medical symposia in more than 30 cities the government view that recovery from throughout the country. Each event out- a massive nuclear attack was merely a lined for an overflow crowd how the cata- matter of advance planning. clysmic effects of a nuclear attack on the US would leave the medical community helplessly short of personnel, medical supplies, and hospital beds needed to treat victims and alleviate human suffering. Making the nuclear issue relevant to ev- eryone, these symposia built an activist network across the nation among health care workers and other concerned citizens, and fostered public support for arms control and a nuclear weapons freeze. IPPNW and the Nobel Peace Prize PSR’s success inspired the formation of International Physicians for the Preven- tion of Nuclear War (IPPNW) in 1981. IPPNW helped open arms control discus- sions between the US and the Soviet Union and fostered an international physicians’ anti-nuclear movement that was recog- nized with the Nobel Peace Prize in 1985. THOUSANDS Sounding the Alarm about Fallout US-Soviet Physicians Campaign THRONG TO HEAR In the 1960s, PSR realized that, despite In the mid-1980s, PSR and its Soviet government assurances, open-air nuclear counterpart conducted a series of pioneer- HELEN CALDICOTT, tests were exposing Americans to danger- ing exchanges, bringing dozens of Soviet MD, TAKE PSR’S ous levels of radiation. To prove their and US physicians together in local com- MESSAGE ACROSS hypothesis, PSR physicians around the munities throughout both countries. De- country gathered the baby teeth of local mystifying the “enemy,” participants THE NATION. children. Tests on these teeth showed the shared medical and cultural information, presence of strontium 90, a by-product of discussed arms control strategies, and met nuclear testing. This finding built public capacity crowds at press conferences support for a halt to US atmospheric tests and public events. 4 Lessons from Chernobyl Taking on the Air Force, PSR chapters In the aftermath of the Chernobyl acci- in North Carolina, Oregon, Maine, and dent, journalists turned to PSR for Massachusetts blocked plans for Ground reliable projections of the health effects of Wave Emergency Network (GWEN) the disaster. Despite the secrecy with towers in their regions by holding commu- which the Soviet Union cloaked its nuclear nity meetings and voicing loud opposition program, a team of PSR physicians visited to the proposal for an exten- Chernobyl victims in Moscow Hospital #6. sive, post-nuclear-war They brought home firsthand accounts of communication system. the radiation health effects and provided a medical perspective on the crisis. Poking Holes in Star Wars Scenarios for Disaster To illuminate In the 1980s, PSR repeatedly exposed the fallacy of the federal nuclear-war civil defense planning Strategic Defense as naive and futile. We aided municipal Initiative (SDI), officials who, shocked by the Federal PSR created an um- Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) brella with 5 percent of plan to evacuate whole cities in the event its surface cut away, mak- of a nuclear war, withheld their coopera- ing it plain that the proposed tion; more than 300 cities ultimately re- 95-percent-effective SDI system jected FEMA’s plans. When FEMA threat- was simply full of holes. We distributed DAVID FRASZ, MD, ened to withhold funds from states that umbrellas to every House and Senate of- USES A PROP TO balked at the evacuation exercises, PSR fice. Keeping the arms race out of space chapters in Washington and Oregon cir- has been a recurrent effort: PSR helped ILLUSTRATE THE culated copies of FEMA’s absurd scenario, uphold a 1985 ban on anti-satellite (ASAT) FLAWS IN A while PSR experts debunked the plan on weapons tests, worked to lower Star Wars 95%-EFFECTIVE Capitol Hill. Finally, Congress ordered funding, and is opposing current national an embarrassed FEMA to back down. missile defense schemes. STAR WARS SHIELD. Cincinnati Post PSR’S 1987 SOVIET The PHYSICIANS TOUR BRINGS RUSSIAN DOCTORS TO A BILINGUAL SCHOOL IN CINCINNATI. Photo by Melvin Grier, reprinted withof permission reprinted Melvin Grier, Photo by 5 he Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban, more than any T other issue, demonstrates PSR’s endurance and persistence over its nearly 40-year history. The Limited Test Ban Treaty of 1963 the long road to a (see page 2) ended the era of atmo- spheric nuclear tests, but the super- nuclear test ban powers continued to explode their bombs underground, contaminating vast swaths of land and using their testing data to fuel a treacherous arms race. Personal appeals to Soviet Presi- dent Gorbachev from IPPNW lead- ers helped prompt the USSR to de- clare a unilateral moratorium on nuclear tests in 1985 and again in 1991. PSR responded by pressing the US to cease testing and to open negotiations for a Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (CTBT). Faced with continued US testing, PSR activists and others in Oregon prodded freshman Congressman Mike Kopetski (D-OR) and Senator Mark Hatfield (R-OR) to take ac- tion. Their bill to put a moratorium on US testing and to start test ban negotiations—also supported by Senators George Mitchell (D-ME) and J. James Exon (D-NE)— passed in 1992, thanks to a tireless effort by PSR chapters and staff, and citizens across the country. Said Senator Hatfield: “The surprise vic- DAVID RUSH, MD, (UPPER tory could never have happened LEFT) PARTICIPATES IN without the support of PSR.” 1993 HIROSHIMA DAY In 1993, PSR helped uncover an administration draft plan to renew OBSERVANCES DURING nuclear testing and to back a weak A CTBT CONFERENCE treaty that would have allowed tests under one kiloton. At PSR’s urging, SPONSORED BY IPPNW 38 Senators and 159 Representa- ON BOARD A SHIP IN tives called on President Clinton to THE BARENTS SEA. extend the moratorium and pursue a 6 truly comprehensive nuclear test CHIEF RAYMOND ban; he acceded. In 1995, when US YOWELL OF THE officials again wavered, PSR worked WESTERN with foreign governments and mem- bers of Congress to build opposition SHOSHONE to a proposed 500-ton-threshold NATION SPEAKS treaty, then mobilized 35,000 citi- zens to call the White House in sup- AT A 1993 CTBT port of a comprehensive treaty. The CITIZEN’S SUMMIT President finally explicitly endorsed ORGANIZED a true “zero-yield” test ban. When international CTBT nego- BY PSR. tiations finally opened, PSR faced new obstacles at home and abroad. In June 1996, PSR pushed the Senate to defeat the Kyl-Reid amendment, which would have un- dermined the treaty by allowing US tests. When India and Iran dead- locked CTBT negotiations in Au- gust, PSR rallied support for an Australian resolution to bring the treaty directly to the UN.