Peter Wilk, MD

PSR Board of Directors has named Peter Wilk, MD, as Executive Director of PSR.  Dr. Wilk is a recognized expert on nuclear disarmament and has been active for the past 27 years in public health advocacy organizations and medical organizations concerned with preventing nuclear war and addressing other threats to global survival.  He has a long association with PSR, having served as a PSR Board member for many years and as PSR’s President in 1995 and 2000.  Dr. Wilk has been acting director of security programs at PSR in Washington since September 2008.

Dr. Wilk has held leadership positions with International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW), acting as the Co-Vice President for North America from 1996 to 2000 and Speaker of the International Council from 2004 to 2008.  He served as Congress Chair and led in organizing the 2002 joint PSR & IPPNW “Summit for Survival” World Congress in Washington, DC. He also served as the President of PSR/Maine from 1983 to 1994 and from 1998 to 2008.

In Maine, Dr. Wilk developed and led a two-year campaign that included public education, mobilizing activists, letter-writing, op-eds, and lobbying that resulted in Senator Susan Collins’ decision to oppose the nuclear bunker buster and, ultimately, in the cancellation of that program.

As a leader in the effort to increase physician involvement in environment and security issues, Dr. Wilk has had a major part in organizing various statewide conferences, the most recent of which include a series of three environmental health conferences over the past six years titled Making the Connection I, II, and III.  Prior Maine conferences he led in organizing include The Road to Nuclear Abolition, Achieving Global Energy Security and First Monday 2000; Working Together to Reduce Gun Violence.  He is the recipient of the 1988 PSR Broad Street Pump Award, 1993 Seeds of Peace Award, Dana Hanley Memorial Trust Leadership Award and the 2005 Distinguished Service Award from the American Lung Association of Maine. 

Dr. Wilk is the author of Social Responsibility is Our Responsibility, a piece published in Hall A, University of Vermont College of Medicine alumni magazine.  He is also the co-author of Projected Casualties among U.S. Military Personnel and Civilian Populations from the Use of Nuclear Weapons against Hard and Deeply Buried Targets.  In addition, Dr. Wilk has published a long list of op-ed pieces in support of nuclear abolition.

Dr. Wilk has been practicing psychiatry at a number of different settings in Maine since 1981.  He earned his B.A. Cum Laude from Harvard College in 1972 and his M.D. from The University of Vermont College of Medicine in 1977.