«Doctors of the World for Peace» — is an international day that was proposed by Doctors of the World for the Prevention of Nuclear War. It is celebrated on the anniversary of the terrible tragedy — of the day of the bombing of the Japanese city of Hiroshima on August 6, 1945.
This day is in some ways symbolic and serves as a reminder of this human tragedy, of the role of doctors in the struggle for peace and in preventing war in general. The organization celebrates this day with its daily work. After all, it is doctors who save human lives.
For more than 70 years now, every year on August 6 at 8:15 a.m., the Japanese city of Hiroshima has frozen for a — minute of silence. With their hands folded at their chests and their heads tilted, elderly and young Japanese, mothers and children, teachers and officials — are all at this moment thinking about that terrible day on August 6, 1945, when an atomic bomb was dropped on a peaceful city. Also on this day, commemorative events are held in Hiroshima Peace Park, where the eternal flame burns in front of the monument to the victims of the bombing with the inscription «Sleep peacefully, the mistake will not be repeated».
As a result of this bombing, about 100 thousand people were killed and missing, more than 160 thousand people were injured and exposed to radioactive radiation, and to this day the victims of this event continue to die from radiation sickness.
And three days later, an atomic bomb with a plutonium charge of the same power was dropped on another Japanese city — Nagasaki...
10 years after these tragic events, the first international conference for the prohibition of atomic and hydrogen weapons was held in Hiroshima, and in 1985 the South Pacific Ocean was declared a nuclear-free zone (Treaty of Rarotonga).
Doctors of the World for the Prevention of Nuclear War (WMPW). International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War, IPPNW) — is an international health workers movement aimed at preventing nuclear conflict and promoting nuclear disarmament. The organization was founded in 1980 by American professor of cardiology at the Harvard Institute of Public Health Bernard Lowne and Soviet doctors of medical sciences, director of the All-Union Cardiology Research Center of the USSR Academy of Medical Sciences Evgeny Chazov and academician of the USSR Academy of Medical Sciences Leonid Ilyin. Since then, large branches of «Doctors of the World» have appeared in dozens of countries around the world, and today this movement unites over 200 thousand doctors in its ranks, and the number of its supporters continues to grow. Every year on August 6 they organize various charity and educational events.