Spokane7
53°
January 23, 2010 in City
Smoker’s family helps others quit
Donations will help fund health district programs
Shirley Wagoner remembers her big brother sneaking out to the woods behind their St. Maries home when he was a teenager to smoke cigarettes.
“In the ’50s, it was cool,” she said. “It meant you were grown up.”
Her brother, Dick Case, finally managed to quit 10 or 15 years ago, but by then it was too late, she said. Case, a substance abuse counselor and poet who lived in the Coeur d’Alene area, died Jan. 8 at age 74. He blamed smoking for killing him, Wagoner said.
Three days after his memorial, a friend of the family stopped by the Panhandle Health District in Hayden with a plastic bag containing more than $500 from Case’s sister and daughters. Wagoner said the family also offered volumes of Case’s poetry at his memorial service for a voluntary donation and added that money to the pot. The money was donated to the district’s Smoking Cessation and Prevention Program.
“I think he would have been pleased if he could have helped one person quit smoking,” said Wagoner, who lives in Spokane Valley. “If just one person could quit smoking because of his death then that’s a good thing.”
The money comes at a good time, because funding for the program has declined, said Cynthia Taggart, a health district spokeswoman. The approximately decade-old program is funded by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and by the Idaho Millennium Fund, established by the Legislature in 2000 to disburse money from the massive national settlement with tobacco manufacturers.
Linda Harder, a district health educator, said cessation programs last year received $66,200 from the Millennium Fund. This year, the programs were only funded through June 30, with $35,300. The CDC grants also have decreased, she said. She acknowledged, however, that state Legislature funding decisions are pending. “If we end up with no funding, that’s going to be very hurtful,” Harder said.
Last year, the health district helped 51 teenagers and 37 adults quit smoking, in addition to helping dozens reduce their tobacco use. It also helped 16 pregnant women and young mothers stop using tobacco. The program offers free four-week smoking cessation classes year-round. The classes cover nicotine addiction, battling withdrawal symptoms, stress management techniques, nutrition and exercise tips and other services, including free individual consultations.
Wagoner said her mother lived to the age of 91 and she feels certain her brother would have lived another 15 or 20 years if he hadn’t smoked. Case died of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. “It’s an awful way to die because he couldn’t breathe,” she said. “He would say, ‘I’m like a fish out of water.’ ”
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SugarShane on January 23 at 11:02 a.m.
Its funny that something like tobacco which is proven to kill you and makes our health care costs skyrocket taking care of these idiots that slowly kill themselves is legal, while cannabis which is proven to be safe and effective in treating scores of medical ailments remains demonized by the public at large. We keep letting people like Duncan and Clemmons out of jail so that we can make room for non violent drug using offenders. Lets get our priorities straight for once, when the legislation for decriminalization comes around, please add your signature. If we really wanted to call a drug dope, we should have picked alcohol or tobacco, those choices make more logical sense.