Part 2 Of Guam News Factor's Series On Smoking

GUAM - Last week Guam News Factor featured a story on the Guam Medical Society’s (GMS) plans to seek national support to raise the price of cigarettes on Guam.

Dr. Jerone Landstrom has been selected as the American Medical Association (AMA) Delegate from Guam to attend the annual meeting this June and he will be armed with a resolution that represents the first salvo in what is certain to be a fight to raise the price of smoking tobacco products on Guam. The resolution submitted by the GMS has been listed by the AMA for presentation and for potential action.

Dr. Sam Friedman, cancer specialist and president of GMS has much to say about the issue and dismissed any requests for gripping numbers and figures on the estimated annual costs to treat smoking related illnesses.  The actual number of revenues generated by cigarette sales or collected by cigarette distributors is difficult to obtain.  For Friedman who described those data as, “probably a well-guarded secret,” it is the “loss of human lives and blatant neglect for human suffering” that the community better pay attention to.

Instead he insisted figures can barely be calculated as they will increase exponentially if people continue to smoke.  Friedman believes if people pay closer attention to the crippling devastation cigarette smoking wreaks on us now and how it will continue to affect us in the future, these types of figures could easily turn into hundreds of thousands of dollars for each patient being treated for a smoking related illness.  Friedman continued by saying that each smoker who develops a smoking related illness will require health care and accrue treatment costs for up to 20 years, which will confound an already fragile and exhausted health care system on Guam.

Friedman's chief concern is the deterioration of human life and the exponential damage that will occur as a result of the continued smoking habits of Guam residents.

“These numbers are staggering,” said Friedman who claims half of the cancers he treats in his practice are entirely or at least in part caused by smoking.  “This doesn’t even account for any of the cardiovascular diseases,” he added.  With the number of smokers on Guam at the top of national surveys from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the future of treating smoking related illnesses in the future looks bleak.

A continuing trend is the fact that smoking prevalence among adults is higher for those living below the poverty level, which further depletes the abilities of Guam’s health care system.

Guam News Factor continues to support doctors Landstrom and Friedman and the Guam Medical Society in their efforts to save lives.

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