Introduction<br > I write this book with a tremen-<br >dous sense of urgency--as a mother， as a pediatrician， and as a<br >woman--aware that we live on a planet that is terminally ill，<br >infected with lethal macrobes (nuclear weapons) that are metas-<br >taslzing rapidly， the way a cancer spreads in the body. I have been<br >concerned about nuclear war since I was a young teenager， when I<br >read Nevil Shute s book On the Beach. I lived then in Melbourne，<br >Australia， the scene of the story， and the image of the people of<br >Melbourne giving cyanide to their babies as the radioactive fallout<br >was about to strike has stayed with me all my life. The empty streets<br >of ray beloved city， bereft of life， with newspapers blowing vacantly<br >in the wind， signaled the end of human existence.<br > Since that time， I have never felt protected by the adults<br >around me and have never understood why the governments of the<br >world build more nuclear weapons. When I started my first year of<br >medical studios in 1956， at the age of seventeen， 1 was prompted to<br >speak out about the carcinogenic and mutagenic effects of radioac-<br >tive fallout from the atmospheric explosions detonated by the<br >Soviet Union， the United States， and Great Britain. Unfortunate-<br >[y， I spoke In the refectory at lunchtime， and my male medical<br >r， ollel~guos gazed absentmlndedly at me， obviously wondering who<br >d~ls crazy lady was) as they ignored my comments and continued<br >their pQker game. During the remaining years of medical school， 1<br >manttged to suppress my fear and practice a degree of denial--<br >psi chic numbing， It wasn t until 1963， when I was three months<br >