107

Bangor Daily News

Monday, June 26, 1989"

A. Mark Woodward, Editorial Page Editor
Dan Namowitz, Assistant Editor
Richard R. Shaw, Editorial Page Assistant

—E€ditorial

491 Main. St.
Banaor. Maine 04401
Tel. (207) 990-8200

 

C. Everett Koop

He will go down in history as the man who
set the goal of a ‘smokeless society by the
year 2000.” He has been a courageous war-
rior against AIDS, the Reagan appointee
who surprised liberals with his commit-
ment to public health, a man who struck a

balance between anti-abortionists and those

who support freedom of choice.
Seventy-two-year-old Dr. C. Everett

Koop, surgeon general of the United States .

since 1981, will step down July 13 to take up

-media work in the health field. Koop will be .

missed; perhaps downright irreplaceable.
In an era of dissembling bureaucrats and
greedy élected officials, the controversial,
charismatic pediatrician set a tone of frank-
ness for public officials. For this he some-
times paid the price of withering political
assault including bombardment from the
tobacco lobby, and the acrimonious charge
from Phyllis Schlafly that, in advising ho-
mosexuals to use condoms to avoid AIDS,
Koop was advocating ‘‘safe sodomy.”
Koop’s aggressiveness can be appreciat-
ed even more in 1989 when contrasted with
recent revelations about the administration
bureaucrats who attempted to alter scien-
tific testimony before Congress to make it
more in conformity with budget policy.
How quickly the public-health ground pio-

neered by Koop came to he taken for grant- .

ed in America. Just consider some of the
most recent declarations Koop issued from
his pulpit as the nation’s chief public health
officer: ~

@On May 16, 1988, Koop declared that cig-
arettes and other tobacco products were
addictive in a way comparable to the addic-
tiveness of ‘‘drugs such as heroin and co-
caine.’’ The report was hailed by
antismoking forces but denounced by the
Tobacco’ Institute, the tobacco industry

mouthpiece, as a trivializing of the national
drug problem. But Koop hammered away, .
calling for stronger warnings on cigarette
packages, seeking to ban cigarette vending
machines and urging insurance companies
to fund programs to help smokers quit.

@ Koop directed the preparation of the blunt
booklet on AIDS that was mailed to millions
of American homes in May 1988.

eOn Jan. 27, 1988, as a means of gauging
the spread of AIDS, he proposed a day of
testing the entire student body of a major
university in an urban area. The proposal
was controversial, but just last month, re-

‘searchers reported that college students

were testing positive for AIDS more fre- _

- quently than expected. (It was the first at-

tempt to determine the extent of AIDS
infection of college students.)
As recently as last week, in what he called
his last news conference’ as surgeon gen-
eral, Koop did not let up. Calling for volun- ~
tary restrictions on some alcoholic-
beverage advertising practices, extension
of the law including warning labels on alco-
holic-beverage containers, and increased
taxes on alcohol, he again generated the

_ lively debate that has characterized his

terms of service. .
_ Flip through any magazine. Those fam-
ous messages from the surgeon general,
highlighted in a rectangular box at the bot-
tom of the cigarette ads, jump off the page
to catch the eye: “Quitting smoking now
greatly reduces serious risks to your
health.” “Smoking by pregnant women
may result in fetal injury, premature birth,
and low birth weight.”’

Thank you, Dr. Koop, for your accom-
plishments as the official protector of
America’s health.