Smoking: Now is time to quit, HAWC can help

  • Published
  • By Maj. Mark Snow
  • 22nd Air Refueling Wing
MCCONNELL AIR FORCE BASE, Kan. --  Oct. 6, 1939, is an important date in my family history. 

What's so important about it? It's my father's birthday. 

He would have been 67 years old this year if he were still alive. However, he died five years ago from emphysema, a disease that diminishes a person's capacity to breathe and is often caused by smoking. 

So what? What does this have to do with you? Let me explain. 

Don't let what happened to my father happen to you. He was a wonderful man who grew up in the '40s and '50s. He always dreamed of joining the Air Force, and he attended college and joined the Reserve Officers' Training Corps. However, he opted to leave school, and his dreams behind, to raise a family. 

He married my mom in 1958 at 18. They had my oldest brother in 1959. Like many people then, they struggled to make ends meet, and they smoked. 

My father smoked for 32 years. He quit in 1996, but not by choice. He was diagnosed with emphysema. It was so bad he couldn't perform everyday tasks -- like brushing his teeth and taking a shower -- without having to sit down with his oxygen tank and catch his breath. He withered away for five years - going from 175 pounds to 130 pounds. He was subsequently admitted to a hospital in August, 2001, with severe abdominal pain. 

The doctor found he also had cancer of the gall bladder and liver. They could not operate because he was so weak and iron deficient. He could literally have bled to death if they had tried. 

After a week he started complaining of severe headaches. We all thought it was the morphine drip, which he was on 24 hours a day, but it wasn't. He passed away on Aug. 25. 2001, from a tumor, which engulfed the entire left side of his brain. I attribute all of his cancer and emphysema to smoking. 

Since Sept. 11, 2001, we have been at war. This war requires each and every one of us to be fit to fight at a moments notice. Smoking is a habit that inhibits this ability.
Let me give you some statistics I received from the health and wellness center. Approximately 26 percent of Airmen use tobacco products, and almost 21 percent smoke. 

At McConnell, the numbers are even more staggering -- 32 percent use tobacco and 24 percent smoke. In the United States, smoking is responsible for one in every five deaths. Also, smokers miss almost twice as many days of work each year than non-smokers. 

Think of it this way, if, on average a non-smoker misses 15 work days a year from various illnesses, a smoker misses 30. McConnell has roughly 724 personnel who smoke. If 724 personnel miss 30 days per year, (excluding the 30 days of leave they have per year) that adds up to 21,720 man days. Our operations tempo and deployments can't absorb this loss. If you smoke, I beg you to reconsider smoking ... don't wither away like my father - it's truly a long and painful death. 

Your family needs you; the Air Force needs you; your country needs you. You owe it to yourselves to quit smoking and become healthier. Call the HAWC today at ext. 6024, to get started in a smoking cessation program.