Health and Environmental Impacts of Nuclear Weapons and War
March 4 @ 7:00 pm - 8:45 pm PST
SF Bay PSR’s Expert Perspectives CME series!
with Robert M. Gould, MD, President SF Bay PSR
CME credit available!
Over 80 years since the atomic bombings that destroyed Hiroshima and Nagasaki, we face the dawn of a new global nuclear arms race that compounds the climate and pandemic threats to human survival. Today, the nine nuclear weapons-armed states possess over 12,000 nuclear weapons, hundreds of which are on hair-trigger alert.
This presentation will describe the manifold public health threats posed by: current global programs to expand and modernize these nuclear weapons arsenals; the abrogation of international treaties to reduce the dangers; and areas of heightened great-power confrontation.
While ignoring our climate emergency, the U.S. government plans to spend over $4 million an hour over the next 30 years to “modernize” our nuclear weapons arsenal, with profound opportunity costs to public and environmental health. Alternative visions for human survival are offered by the global movement to abolish nuclear weapons embodied in the 2017 UN Treaty to Prohibit Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) In advancing this goal, Physicians for Social Responsibility and coalition partners working within the “Back from the Brink” and similar campaigns have passed anti-nuclear weapons resolutions in many U.S. municipalities, including San Francisco and Los Angeles. Prospects for connecting such campaigns with wider popular movements seeking to transform U.S. and global priorities in the direction of climate, environmental and social justice necessary for global survival will also be explored.
Learning Objectives:
- Summarize the legacy of global public and environmental health impacts of nuclear weapons development, production, testing, and use.
- Describe the historical contribution of physicians and other health professionals in articulating the health voice as a key component of the global peace and disarmament movement.
- Identify current dangers to global public health posed by current nuclear weapons arsenals and plans for modernization.
- Summarize current national and global organizing efforts to rid the world of nuclear weapons, and the challenges to their growth and success.
Robert M. Gould, MD is an Adjunct Assistant Professor in the Department of Obstetrics, Gynecology and Reproductive Sciences at the University of California San Francisco (UCSF) where he works as a Collaborator with the Program on Reproductive Health and the Environment (PRHE). From 1981 until 2012, Dr. Gould worked as a pathologist at Kaiser Hospital in San Jose, California. He has been President of San Francisco-Bay Physicians for Social Responsibility (PSR) since 1989, and was a member of the National Board of PSR from 1993 through 2022, serving as President in 2003 and 2014. Dr. Gould currently is the North American Vice-President of the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW), recipient of the 1985 Nobel Peace Prize. Dr. Gould also serves as Chairperson of the Peace Caucus in Affiliation with the American Public Health Association (APHA), and has co-authored more than a dozen APHA policy statements related to nuclear weapons, peace, and social justice. For his overall contributions, the APHA awarded Dr. Gould the prestigious Sidel-Levy Peace Award in 2009. Dr. Gould has authored numerous book chapters on the health impacts of nuclear weapons including War and Public Health, and Terrorism and Public Health (Oxford University Press).
Accreditation Statement: This activity has been planned and implemented in accordance with the accreditation requirements and policies of the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education (ACCME) through the joint providership of Colorado Medical Society and San Francisco Bay Physicians for Social Responsibility. The Colorado Medical Society is accredited by the ACCME to provide continuing medical education for physicians.
Credit Designation Statement: The Colorado Medical Society designates this live activity for a maximum of 1.75 AMA PRA Category 1 Credits™. Physicians should claim only the credit commensurate with the extent of their participation in the activity.