Helen Caldicott (born 1938) is an Australian physician, author, and anti-nuclear advocate who has founded several associations dedicated to opposing the use of depleted uranium munitions, nuclear weapons, nuclear weapons proliferation, war and military action in general. She hosts a weekly radio program, If You Love This Planet. Born in Melbourne, Australia, Caldicott attended the Fintona Girls’ School, and received her medical degree in 1961 from the University of Adelaide Medical School. In 1977 she joined the staff of the Children’s Hospital Medical Center in Boston, and taught pediatrics at the Harvard Medical School from 1977 to 1978. In 1980, following the Three Mile Island nuclear accident, she left her medical career in order to concentrate on calling the world’s attention to what she refers to as the “insanity” of the nuclear arms race and the growing reliance on nuclear power. In 1982, she was the subject of the controversial Oscar-winning National Film Board of Canada documentary on the dangers of nuclear weapons, entitled If You Love This Planet. Her sixth book, The New Nuclear Danger: George W. Bushs Military Industrial Complex, was published in 2001. While touring with that book, she founded the Nuclear Policy Research Institute, headquartered in Washington, DC. NPRI seeks to facilitate an ongoing public education campaign in the mainstream media about what it perceives as the dangers of nuclear energy, including weapons and power programs and policies. It …
