Author: Ariel Conn

Nuclear Weapons Abolition

Nuclear Weapons Abolition

IPPNW is the leading medical organization dedicated to the global elimination of nuclear weapons. Since the very beginning of the nuclear age, with the US atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, physicians have recognized that the devastating consequences of nuclear war can only be prevented if these weapons of mass destruction are abolished.

The Medical Evidence

In order to understand why nuclear weapons must be eliminated, you should learn about their unique characteristics and their consequences to health and our environment. You can begin with an overview of essential facts. Those looking for in-depth information can visit our archive of multimedia resources, which includes dozens of downloadable studies and reports on various aspects of nuclear weapons effects.

The role of physicians in educating the public about the medical consequences of nuclear weapons and nuclear war

The facts about nuclear weapons

The health and humanitarian impacts of nuclear weapons

Nuclear Famine: climate effects of regional nuclear war

Learn more about ICAN—the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons

Explore IPPNW’s large collection of resources on nuclear weapons, nuclear war, and related topics, including books and scientific papers, journal articles, Powerpoint presentations, videos, and more.

Banning Nuclear Weapons: The Humanitarian Facts

An IPPNW Campaign Kit

An evidence-based understanding of the humanitarian impact of nuclear weapons has become the driving force behind a renewed State and civil society demand for effective action to prohibit and eliminate nuclear weapons. The facts about nuclear weapons and the consequences of their use were the subject of three international conferences starting in 2013—in Oslo, Nayarit, and Vienna. Those conferences—and a series of joint statements on the humanitarian impact of nuclear weapons submitted to the UN General Assembly—led in 2016 to a UNGA resolution authorizing negotiations on a new treaty to ban nuclear weapons. The Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) was negotiated and adopted by the UN in July 2017.

The facts about nuclear weapons—their unprecedented destructive power, their massive and indiscriminate medical and environmental effects, their capacity to wipe out everything that sustains life on Earth—have been extensively documented in hundreds of books, journal articles, and scientific papers. Campaigners for nuclear abolition are faced with the challenge of presenting the facts correctly and persuasively, and they must often do so in the few moments they have the attention of a government minister, a parliamentarian, a politician, a journalist, or a person on the street.

ICAN—the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons—was launched by IPPNW in 2007, and received the 2017 Nobel Peace Prize for its work to achieve the TPNW.  ICAN and IPPNW have argued that the humanitarian threat posed by nuclear weapons requires both a treaty banning them and their elimination through the full implementation of that treaty.

The purpose of this kit is to provide ICAN campaigners—and all others working to prohibit and eliminate nuclear weapons—with the essential facts about the blast, burn, and radiation effects of nuclear weapons; the devastation they wreak upon the environment; and the inability of physicians to reach and treat the surviving victims of nuclear war; in language that is accessible, understandable, repeatable and, we hope, persuasive.

ICRC on Nuclear Weapons

ICRC on Nuclear Weapons

Since the first and only use of nuclear weapons in 1945, the international community has wrestled with the issue of how the law of war applies to such weapons. For decades the discourse about nuclear weapons was focused on their military and security aspects and concerns about their proliferation. Increasingly, however, the debate is expanding to include a focus on their international humanitarian law (IHL) implications, as well as their catastrophic humanitarian consequences.

While a number of international agreements to limit the development and proliferation of nuclear weapons were already in place, these weapons were only internationally prohibited in 2017, when the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) was adopted. The International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement had been calling for a ban on nuclear weapons since 1945 and welcomed the adoption of the TPNW as a historic and long-awaited step towards their elimination. Given current regional and international tensions, the risk of nuclear weapons being used is the highest it has ever been since the Cold War. To ensure that nuclear weapons are never used again and are completely eliminated, the Movement calls on States to join the ban treaty and to fulfill their longstanding nuclear disarmament obligations and commitments.

Banning nuclear weapons is justified on humanitarian, moral, and legal terms. Nuclear weapons are the most destructive weapons ever created and their testing and use would have catastrophic humanitarian consequences. These consequences result from the heat, blast and radiation generated by a nuclear explosion and the distances over which these forces may be spread. As was seen from the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945, the detonation of a nuclear weapon in or near a populated area can cause enormous numbers of casualties and extensive damage to civilian infrastructure. It can destroy medical infrastructure and services making the provision of aid and assistance almost impossible, demonstrating the lack of adequate humanitarian response capacity in the immediate aftermath. Many of those who survive the blast will fall victim to radiation sickness in the weeks and months that follow, while others face an increased risk of developing certain cancers later in life.

In 1996 the International Court of Justice concluded that the use of nuclear weapons would be generally contrary to the principles and rules of IHL. The Court also decided that States were under an obligation to pursue and conclude negotiations leading to nuclear disarmament. With the recent adoption of the ban treaty, the legal framework towards the elimination of nuclear weapons is stronger than ever. By joining it, States are fulfilling their responsibility to protect humanity from nuclear catastrophe, based on a vision of security without nuclear weapons, a security that is more viable and humane.

ICRC Nuclear Weapons Resources

ICRC Nuclear Weapons Resources

Since the only use of nuclear weapons in 1945, the world has wrestled with the issue of how IHL applies to such weapons. The International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement calls on States to ensure they are never used again and to prohibit their use and eliminate them through a binding agreement.

Here, the ICRC has compiled a comprehensive resource collection of the work they’ve done on nuclear weapons.

Video: A price too high: Rethinking nuclear weapons in light of their human cost

A price too high: Rethinking nuclear weapons in light of their human cost

The e-briefing you are about to enter shows the catastrophic humanitarian consequences of nuclear weapons. These consequences have been known to the world since the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945. Yet for many, a full appreciation of the effects of nuclear weapons in humanitarian terms has faded.

https://e-brief.icrc.org/issue/nuclear-weapons-the-human-cost/introduction/

Content from the E-briefing page:

Read the entire e-briefing.

The U.N. Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons

The U.N. Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons

On 7 July 2017 – following a decade of advocacy by ICAN and its partners – an overwhelming majority of the world’s nations adopted a landmark global agreement to ban nuclear weapons, known officially as the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. On 22 January 2021, the treaty will enter into force.

Prior to the treaty’s adoption, nuclear weapons were the only weapons of mass destruction not subject to a comprehensive ban, despite their catastrophic, widespread and persistent humanitarian and environmental consequences. The new agreement fills a significant gap in international law.


It prohibits nations from developing, testing, producing, manufacturing, transferring, possessing, stockpiling, using or threatening to use nuclear weapons, or allowing nuclear weapons to be stationed on their territory. It also prohibits them from assisting, encouraging or inducing anyone to engage in any of these activities.


A nation that possesses nuclear weapons may join the treaty, so long as it agrees to destroy them in accordance with a legally binding, time-bound plan. Similarly, a nation that hosts another nation’s nuclear weapons on its territory may join, so long as it agrees to remove them by a specified deadline.


Nations are obliged to provide assistance to all victims of the use and testing of nuclear weapons and to take measures for the remediation of contaminated environments. The preamble acknowledges the harm suffered as a result of nuclear weapons, including the disproportionate impact on women and girls, and on indigenous peoples around the world.


The treaty was negotiated at the United Nations headquarters in New York in March, June and July 2017, with the participation of more than 135 nations, as well as members of civil society. It opened for signature on 20 September 2017. It is permanent in nature and will be legally binding on those nations that join it.

The World’s Nuclear Weapons

The World’s Nuclear Weapons

A single nuclear warhead could kill hundreds of thousands of people, with lasting and devastating humanitarian and environmental consequences. Russia, the United States, the United Kingdom, France, China, India, Pakistan, Israel and North Korea possess an estimated total of nearly 14,000 nuclear weapons, most of which are many times more powerful than the nuclear weapon dropped on Hiroshima. Thirty-one other states are also part of the problem. 

Learn more about all of the countries that support nuclear weapons.

Nuclear Weapons History

Nuclear Weapons History

Nuclear Weapons History

Read More
Continue Reading

Why a Ban?

Why a Ban?

Nuclear weapons are the most inhumane and indiscriminate weapons ever created. That is why it is time to end them, before they end us.

Nuclear weapons are the most inhumane and indiscriminate weapons ever created. They have catastrophic humanitarian and environmental consequences that span decades and cross generations; they breed fear and mistrust among nations, as some governments can threaten to wipe out entire cities in a heartbeat; the high cost of their production, maintenance and modernisation diverts public funds from health care, education, disaster relief and other vital services. Banning these immoral, inhumane weapons under international law was a critical step along the path to ending them. 

With the adoption of the UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) on July 7th, 2017, the world’s majority took a critical step towards making that nuclear-weapon-free future a reality. 

Read more about how the TPNW works >

The Catastrophic Harm of Nuclear Weapons

The Catastrophic Harm of Nuclear Weapons

Nuclear weapons are the most destructive, inhumane and indiscriminate weapons ever created. Both in the scale of the devastation they cause, and in their uniquely persistent, spreading, genetically damaging radioactive fallout, they are unlike any other weapons. A single nuclear bomb detonated over a large city could kill millions of people. The use of tens or hundreds of nuclear bombs would disrupt the global climate, causing widespread famine.

What makes nuclear weapons the worst

1 A single nuclear weapon can destroy a city and kill most of its people. Several nuclear explosions over modern cities would kill tens of millions of people. Casualties from a major nuclear war between the US and Russia would reach hundreds of millions.

Modeling the effects on cities →
Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings →

2 The extreme destruction caused by nuclear weapons cannot be limited to military targets or to combatants.

Blast, heat and radiation →
Outlawing inhumane weapons →

3 Nuclear weapons produce ionizing radiation, which kills or sickens those exposed, contaminates the environment, and has long-term health consequences, including cancer and genetic damage.

The legacy of nuclear testing →
Nuclear weapons production →

4 Less than one percent of the nuclear weapons in the world could disrupt the global climate and threaten as many as two billion people with starvation in a nuclear famine. The thousands of nuclear weapons possessed by the US and Russia could bring about a nuclear winter, destroying the essential ecosystems on which all life depends.

Climate disruption and famine →

5 Physicians and first responders would be unable to work in devastated, radioactively contaminated areas. Even a single nuclear detonation in a modern city would strain existing disaster relief resources to the breaking point; a nuclear war would overwhelm any relief system we could build in advance. Displaced populations from a nuclear war will produce a refugee crisis that is orders of magnitude larger than any we have ever experienced.

No humanitarian response →

6 Whether or not they are detonated, nuclear weapons cause widespread harm to health and to the environment.

7 Spending on nuclear weapons detracts limited resources away from vital social services. 

Diversion of public resources→

Learn more about these issues and join ICAN’s effort.