IPPNW Calls for an Immediate Ceasefire and Return to Diplomacy with Iran

EDITOR'S INTRODUCTION: International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW) has just issued a most important statement calling for an immediate ceasefire and return to diplomacy with Iran. We must understand that if this conflict escalates beyond a certain (and unknown) threshold, it is almost certain to draw the U.S. and Russia (the two major nuclear powers) into the conflict, significantly raising the stakes and vastly increasing the risk of a global nuclear war. This is a risk that Humanity cannot afford to take. Everyone must speak out, demanding an end to Israel's current conduct and the charting of a diplomatic course to a peaceful resolution of this conflict.

Statement issued JUNE 13, 2025

The International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW) condemns Israel’s military strikes on Iran and calls for an immediate ceasefire to prevent further escalation and the loss of civilian life.

Iran is not currently assessed by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) or the US government to have an active nuclear weapons program. This attack by a nuclear-armed state undermines ongoing US-led diplomatic efforts to restore non-proliferation efforts in the region.

IPPNW urges Iran to fully comply with its obligations under the 1970 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and IAEA safeguards, and to re-engage in negotiations with the United States at the earliest possible date. Israel, the region’s only nuclear-armed state, must support these efforts and take concrete steps toward disarmament, notably by participating in the establishment of a Middle East Weapons of Mass Destruction Free Zone. We urge Iran, Israel, and all UN Member States to join the nearly 100 states that have already signed on to the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW).

The declared nuclear weapons states – the US, Russia, China, France, and the UK – bear substantial responsibility for the progressive weakening of the global non-proliferation regime.  Not only have they failed to honor their disarmament obligations under the NPT, but they are also going further by making massive investments in new nuclear weapons and capabilities. The US decision under the first Trump administration to withdraw from the 2015 Iran nuclear deal (JCPOA) is another major contributing failure that has led to this latest regional and global crisis.  

The humanitarian and environmental consequences of any use of nuclear weapons would be catastrophic. A single nuclear detonation over any major city would cause mass casualties and overwhelm health systems; a nuclear war of any size would trigger global climate disruption and a famine that could affect billions. Humanity is already closer to nuclear war than at any point since the Cold War. We cannot survive the addition of another nuclear-armed state.

There is no military solution to the growing risk of nuclear proliferation. Indeed, war and armed violence further incentivizes states to seek nuclear weapons. The only reliable path to security is through diplomacy and the irreversible elimination of nuclear weapons.

CLICK HERE to read the full statement at the IPPNW website.

END NOTE: IPPNW was founded in 1980 with the "goal of creating a more peaceful and secure world freed from the threat of nuclear annihilation", and was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1985 for its efforts.

TAKE ACTION: You can take action by calling on your members of Congress to embrace the War Powers Act and stop any U.S. support for Israel's strikes on Iran.

“Do not let the nuclear armed states lead us down the path to death.”

EDITOR'S INTRODUCTION: Dr. Ira Helfand delivered a compelling statement on behalf of International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW) at the Third Preparatory Committee for the 2026 Review Conference of the Parties to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) at the United Nations Headquarters in New York City, 30 April 2025. He concluded the statement with a call to action: "The world is at a crossroads.  We have before us the choice of life or death.  Do not let the nuclear armed states lead us down the path to death." 

Having worked in emergency medicine, Dr. Helfand knows that there will not be enough - if any at all - emergency rooms, let alone burn unit beds, should even a "limited" nuclear war break out. The (initial) survivors will be on their own, and they will envy the dead! It is not a matter of if, but when, humanity suffers what will be the final war, so long as countries continue to brandish nuclear weapons. The U.S. is building up its nuclear arsenal once again, setting the (wrong) example for other countries, rather than leading the way to a world without the threat of nuclear war. 

Will we choose life... or death???

This statement was originally published on April 30, 2025 at the IPPNW Peace & Health Blog. Dr. Helfand is an IPPNW Board Member.

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Distinguished delegates, esteemed colleagues, and honored guests,

Dr. Ira Helfand delivering IPPNW’s statement to the 2025 NPT Preparatory Committee

Thank you for the opportunity to speak with you today. I am not a diplomat. I am an Emergency Room doctor who has spent the last 50 years speaking with patients and their families. So let me talk to you now as I would to the family of a critically ill patient.

Because that is the situation we face. The world, for which we are collectively responsible, is in terrible danger. Nine countries, five of them parties to this Treaty, have chosen to build arsenals of nuclear weapons that effectively hold all of humanity, including their own citizens, hostage. They want these weapons because they make them strong and allow them to bully the rest of the world. They justify these weapons with the illusion that they offer security. That is a dangerous lie. These weapons are the greatest threat to our survival and pose an existential threat to civilization.

Like the chronic smoker who lives in denial about the risk of developing lung cancer, we have largely convinced ourselves that nuclear war will never happen. The truth is, we are closer to a nuclear war today than we have ever been and, yet, we go about our daily life as though this sword of Damocles were not hanging over us.

Studies show that a large-scale nuclear war between the United States and Russia, who together possess nearly 90% of the world’s nuclear weapons, would end life as we know it. Most of this city, including this very building we are sitting in, would be vaporized and 12 to 15 million people would simply disappear. Across both countries, an estimated 200-300 million people would be killed in the first half hour. Survivors would be left in a radioactive waste field with no electric grid, no internet, no cell phones, no health care, no food distribution system, no banking system, and no system for maintaining law and order. In the following months, most of those who initially survived would die—from radiation poisoning, epidemic disease, exposure, and starvation.  

But this is only part of the story. The impacts of this war would ripple far beyond the borders of the US and Russia. The enormous fires that consumed the cities of Russia and America would loft millions of tons of soot into the upper atmosphere, blocking out the sun and causing global temperatures to plummet by an average of 10 degrees C. In the interior regions of North America and Eurasia temperatures would drop 25 to 30 degrees C. We have not seen temperatures that cold since the last Ice Age. 

Under these conditions, ecosystems that have evolved since the end of that Ice Age will collapse; food production will stop and, according to a landmark study published in 2022, 6 billion people, three quarters of humanity, will starve in the first two years. The study stopped at 2 years. The famine would not, and we do not know what the ultimate death toll will be. That same study showed that a much smaller-scale war, such as one between India and Pakistan, will cause enough climate disruption to trigger a famine that will kill a quarter of humanity—2 billion people globally in the first 2 years.

The nuclear powers assure us that this will never happen — that deterrence will prevent nuclear weapons from ever being used. They push this myth even as they threaten to use these very weapons.

But the truth is that nuclear weapons do not possess some magical power that guarantees they will never be used. In fact, there have been numerous incidents throughout the nuclear weapons era when we have come within minutes of the holocaust I have just described. We have not survived because deterrence works, because our leaders have been all wise, our military policies and doctrines sound and our technology perfect. We have survived, to use the words of former US Defense Secretary Robert McNamara, because, “We lucked out…It was luck that prevented nuclear war.”

Five of the nine nuclear powers have a binding obligation under Article VI of this Treaty to engage in good faith negotiations for the elimination of nuclear weapons. Yet they have ignored this obligation for nearly 6 decades. The US and Russia have actually gone further by abandoning every nuclear arms control agreement except for New START, and that will expire next February. These failures, taken together with the destabilizing and deadly wars in Ukraine and Gaza, are causing some non-nuclear parties to the NPT to seek access to nuclear weapons. 

When 121 non nuclear nations came together to uphold Article VI and negotiated the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW), the nuclear armed states chose not to join that historic effort but to boycott the negotiations and do everything they could to undermine the new Treaty using the bizarre claim, straight out of 1984’s Ministry of Truth, that the TPNW “undermined” the NPT. This review conference needs to call out their horrific failure to honor their Article VI obligations. The N-9 should address any concerns with the TPNW by meaningfully engaging with States Parties and joining the Treaty’s official proceedings. 

They must come together, agree to a detailed timetable to eliminate their nuclear arsenals, adhere to the TPNW’s provisions, and join the Treaty at the earliest possible date. 

The world is at a crossroads.  We have before us the choice of life or death.  Do not let the nuclear armed states lead us down the path to death.

“Historic” U.N. Vote for Nuclear Weapons Ban

EDITOR'S NOTE: The United Nations General Assembly voted yesterday to move forward to negotiate a total ban on nuclear weapons. This is a historic vote, and is the beginning of a global effort to finally move past the archaic stonewalling of the nuclear-armed nations that has made a sham of treaty obligations (e.g., the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons). The following news release from the Institute for Public Accuracy contains an analysis of the vote by Ira Helfand, past president of Physicians for Social Responsibility and current co-president of International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War. Time to move forward!!!

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AP reports: “United Nations member states voted overwhelmingly on Thursday to approve a resolution calling for negotiations on a treaty that would outlaw nuclear weapons, despite strong opposition from nuclear-armed nations and their allies.

“The vote in the U.N. disarmament and international security committee saw 123 nations voting in favor of the resolution, 38 opposing and 16 abstaining.

“The resolution was sponsored by Austria, Brazil, Ireland, Mexico, Nigeria and South Africa.

“The United States, Russia, Israel, France and the United Kingdom were among the countries voting against the measure.

“The resolution now goes to a full General Assembly vote sometime in December.”

IRA HELFAND, MD, @IPPNW
    Helfand is past president of Physicians for Social Responsibility and is currently co-president of that group’s global federation, the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War, recipient of the 1985 Nobel Peace Prize.

Helfand said today: “In an historic move the United Nations First Committee voted Thursday to convene a conference next March to negotiate a new treaty to ban the possession of nuclear weapons. The vote is a huge step forward in the campaign to rid the world of nuclear weapons launched several years ago by non-nuclear weapons states and civil society from across the globe.

“Dismayed by the failure of the nuclear weapons states to honor their obligation under Article VI of the Non-Proliferation Treaty which requires them to pursue good faith negotiations for the elimination of their nuclear arsenals, and moved by the growing danger of nuclear war, more than 120 nations gathered in Oslo in March of 2013 to review the latest scientific data about the catastrophic consequences that will result from the use of nuclear weapons. The conference shifted the focus of international discussion about nuclear war from abstract consideration of nuclear strategy to an evaluation of the medical data about what will actually happen if these weapons are used. It was boycotted by all of the major nuclear powers, the U.S., Russia, UK, China and France, the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council, or P5.

“Further meetings in Nayarit, Mexico and Vienna followed in 2014 and culminated in a pledge by the Austrian government to ‘close the gap’ in international law that does yet specifically outlaw the possession of these weapons. More than 140 countries ultimately associated themselves with the pledge which was fiercely opposed by the United States and the other nuclear weapons states, and in the fall of 2015 the U.N. General Assembly voted to establish an Open Ended Working Group which met in Geneva earlier this year and recommended the negotiations approved Thursday.

“The United States, which led the opposition, had hoped to limit the ‘Yes’ vote to less than one hundred, but failed badly. The final vote was 123 For, 38 Against and 16 Abstentions. The ‘No’ votes came from the nuclear weapons states, and U.S. allies in NATO, plus Japan, South Korea and Australia, which have treaty ties to the U.S., and consider themselves to be under the protection of the ‘U.S. nuclear umbrella.’

How the nations voted

“But four nuclear weapons states broke ranks, with China, India and Pakistan abstaining, and North Korea voting in favor of the treaty negotiations. In addition, the Netherlands defied intense pressure from the rest of NATO and abstained, as did Finland, which is not a member of NATO but has close ties with the alliance. Japan which voted with the U.S. against the treaty has indicated that it will, nonetheless, participate in the negotiations when they begin in March.

“The U.S, and the other nuclear weapons states will probably try to block final approval of the treaty conference by the General Assembly later this fall, but, following Thursday’s vote, it appears overwhelmingly likely that negotiations will begin in March, and that they will involve a significant majority of U.N. member states, even if the nuclear states continue their boycott.

“The successful completion of a new treaty will not of itself eliminate nuclear weapons. But it will put powerful new pressure on the nuclear weapons states who clearly do not want to uphold their obligations under the Non-Proliferation Treaty even as they insist that the non-nuclear weapons states meet theirs.

“We have come perilously close to nuclear war on multiple occasions during the last 70 years, and we have been incredibly lucky. U.S. nuclear policy cannot continue to be the hope that we will remain lucky in the future. We need to join and lead the growing movement to abolish nuclear weapons and work to bring the other nuclear weapons states into a binding agreement that sets out the detailed time line for eliminating these weapons and the detailed verification and enforcement mechanisms to make sure they are eliminated.

“This will not be an easy task, but we really have no choice. If we don’t get rid of these weapons, someday, perhaps sooner rather than later, they will be used and they will destroy human civilization. The decision is ours.”

Nuclear War: No Cure - Only Prevention (A Call to Medical Professionals)

Editor's Note: This is an important perspective from physicians deeply invested in ridding the world of the scourge of nuclear weapons. They know quite well that for nuclear war, there is no cure - only prevention. Medical professionals have a particular responsibility to support the movement to abolish nuclear weapons, and this letter is a direct appeal. It was recently published in The New England Journal of Medicine

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Perspective
Docs and Nukes — Still a Live Issue
Ira Helfand, M.D., and Victor W. Sidel, M.D.
October 14, 2015 DOI: 10.1056/NEJMp1509202

Seventy years ago, the medical profession alerted the world to the devastating effects of nuclear weapons. Just weeks after the bombing of Hiroshima, Dr. Marcel Junod, a representative of the International Committee of the Red Cross in Japan, visited the devastated city and sent back one of the first eyewitness reports to reach the outside world: “The center of the city was a sort of white patch, flattened and smooth like the palm of a hand. Nothing remained.”

Ever since that time, members of the medical profession have played a key role in warning governments and the public about the danger of nuclear war and the urgent need to abolish nuclear weapons. During the period of intense international tension that preceded the Cuban Missile Crisis, the Journal devoted the issue of May 31, 1962, to articles prepared by members of the newly formed Physicians for Social Responsibility (PSR), detailing the medical consequences of nuclear war.

During the period of increased Cold War tension in the early 1980s, the medical community mobilized again to educate the public about the enormous threat to public health posed by the arms race. Working with PSR, medical schools throughout the country organized public symposia to explain what would actually happen if nuclear weapons were used. A newly formed global federation called the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW), of which PSR became the U.S. affiliate, carried out similar educational work around the world. Doctors met with Presidents Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev to urge them to end the arms race that had brought the world to the brink of nuclear annihilation.

These efforts had a profound impact. In his memoirs, Gorbachev described the effect his meetings with physicians had on his thinking about nuclear weapons when he was launching the series of initiatives, ultimately embraced by the United States, that led to the end of the arms race. For this work, and in recognition of the special role and responsibility that physicians have had in preventing nuclear war, the IPPNW was awarded the 1985 Nobel Peace Prize.

In the years since the end of the Cold War, the medical community has paid far less attention to this issue. We, like most of the world, have acted as though the danger of nuclear war were a thing of the past. To the extent that we have considered the matter, we have focused on the possibility that terrorists or “rogue states” such as North Korea and Iran will acquire nuclear weapons. Although these are important threats, it is critical that we understand that the greatest danger is posed by the arsenals of the countries that already have nuclear weapons. There remain in the world today more than 15,000 nuclear warheads, 95% of which are in the arsenals of the United States and Russia.(1) Of these warheads, some 2000 are on hair-trigger alert. They can be fired in less than 15 minutes and can destroy their targets across the globe 30 minutes later.

These weapons pose an existential threat to humanity. A 2002 study showed that if just 300 Russian warheads got through to targets in the United States, 75 million to 100 million people would die from the blast and heat effects in the first half hour.(2) In addition, the entire economic infrastructure on which we depend would be destroyed. The public health system, the communications network, the electric grid, the banking system, the food distribution system — all would be gone. In the months after such an attack, the vast majority of Americans not killed in the initial attack would die from starvation, radiation sickness, epidemic disease, or exposure to the elements. A corresponding U.S. attack would create the same devastation in Russia, and if NATO were drawn into the war, much of Europe would suffer the same fate.

As incomprehensible as these direct effects are, they are only a part of the picture. The fires created by the use of nuclear weapons over urban targets would loft enormous quantities of black soot into the atmosphere, disrupting climate worldwide. A war involving the strategic weapons deployed today by the United States and Russia would generate some 150 million tons of soot, enough to reduce temperatures around the world by an average of 8°C. In the interior regions of North America and Eurasia, temperatures would drop by as much as 30°C, to levels not seen in 18,000 years, since the coldest point of the last ice age.(3) Food production would collapse, the vast majority of the human race would starve, and it's possible that our species would become extinct.

For 25 years, since the end of the Cold War, we have been told that we did not need to worry about war between the United States and Russia. The deepening crisis in Ukraine and President Vladimir Putin's repeated nuclear threats give the lie to these assurances: armed conflict between the nuclear superpowers remains a real possibility. Even if neither side ever uses its nuclear weapons deliberately, there remains the very real danger of accidental nuclear war. We know of at least five times since 1979 when either Moscow or Washington prepared to launch nuclear weapons in the mistaken belief that it was already under attack by the other side. U.S. military leaders now warn that cyberterrorists might be able to launch a U.S. or Russian nuclear missile.

Even a much more limited, regional nuclear war, as might take place between India and Pakistan, would have catastrophic consequences worldwide. Studies have shown that a war involving only 100 Hiroshima-sized weapons, less than 0.3% of the world's nuclear arsenals, would cause temperatures to fall an average of 1.25°C around the world.(4) Climate disruption of this magnitude would cause major declines in world agricultural output. At this time, there are some 800 million people who are malnourished and 300 million who get adequate nutrition but live in countries that depend on food imports that would not be available in the event of such a war. There are also about 1 billion people in China, which would see particularly severe effects on food production, who have not shared in China's recent economic growth. All these people, some 2 billion, would be at risk in the “nuclear famine” that would follow even a limited nuclear war.(5)

In recognition of this grave threat to human survival, governments around the world have come together over the past 3 years in a series of extraordinary conferences to discuss the medical consequences, what they have called the humanitarian impact, of nuclear war. A total of 116 countries have signed the Humanitarian Pledge to seek a new treaty to fill a key gap in international law, which does not yet prohibit the possession of these weapons, and to push for their abolition.

We believe the medical community has a responsibility to support this movement. The American Medical Association recently passed a resolution calling on all nations to “ban and eliminate nuclear weapons,” and the World Medical Association is considering a similar resolution at its Moscow meeting in October. Physicians need to act on these resolutions, sounding the alarm for a world that has grown dangerously complacent about the nuclear peril as we drift closer to an unimaginable catastrophe. We need to again educate our patients, the general public, and our political leaders about the medical consequences of nuclear war and the urgent need to abolish these weapons before they are used.

Disclosure forms provided by the authors are available with the full text of this article at NEJM.org.

This article was published on October 14, 2015, at NEJM.org. Source URL: http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMp1509202#t=article

From Physicians for Social Responsibility, Washington, DC (I.H., V.W.S.); the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War, Somerville (I.H., V.W.S.), Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War, Leeds (I.H., V.W.S.), and the Family Care Medical Center, Springfield (I.H.) — all in Massachusetts; and the Department of Social Medicine, Montefiore Medical Center, New York (V.W.S.).

References

1) Federation of American Scientists. Status of world nuclear forces (http://fas.org/issues/nuclear-weapons/status-world-nuclear-forces/).

2) Helfand I, Forrow L, McCally M, Musil R. Projected US casualties and destruction of US medical services from attack by Russian nuclear forces. Med Glob Surviv 2002;7:68-76

3) Robock A, Oman L, Stenchikov GL. Nuclear winter revisited with a modern climate model and current nuclear arsenals: still catastrophic consequences. J Geophys Res 2007;112:xD13107-xD13107 (http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/wol1/doi/10.1029/2006JD008235/full).

4) Robock A, Oman L, Stenchikov GL, Toon OB, Bardeen C, Turco RP. Climatic consequences of regional nuclear conflicts. Atmos Chem Phys 2007;7:2003-2012
CrossRef | Web of Science

5) Helfand I. Nuclear famine: two billion people at risk? International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (http://www.ippnw.org/nuclear-famine.html).