Seventy years after the two devastating atomic bombs on Japan causing 250,000 casualties, there are still 16 500 nuclear weapons worldwid, some of them up to 1,000 times as strong as the bombs of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Instead of phasing elimination – to which the nuclear weapons states have committed themselves in 1970 in the non-proliferation treaty - a multibillion-consuming modernization takes place. By contrast the Appeal stated: medical and infrastructural consequences of a nuclear explosion will be so devastating that doctors and other professionals can do nothing. Contingency plans do not work, hospitals will collapse. Moreover, it is calculated that even a limited nuclear war, between India and Pakistan for example, will lead to years of 'nuclear winter': Soot in the atmosphere keeps away the sunlight, resulting in about two billion deaths, mainly by massive crop failure. And finally, near-accidents with nuclear weapons, through technical and human error, brought us several times very close to the nuclear abyss.
The Medical Appeal states that the only cure is prevention: Make sure that these weapons of mass destruction cannot be used, intentionally or accidentally. Eliminate them, as advocated by the UN.
This message was be presented to civil society and offered to politics. Lectures were given by Susi Snyder (PAX), Herman Spanjaard (co-chair NVMP), Henk Groenewegen (NVMP), Rutger Jan van der Gaag (president Royal Dutch Medical Association), Jan Hoekema,(Mayor of Wassenaar, chair Mayors for Peace The Netherlands), Mirjam de Bruin (Red Cross) and Alexander Rinnooy Kan (personal capacity), Chairman Peter Buijs, (co-chair NVMP).
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