Category Archives: COPD

COPD, emphysema, Lung disease, vaclav havel

Vaclav Havel, victim of smoking and lung disease

January 9, 2012 Pepe Lepew 1 Comment

This is a catching up story. I actually have been meaning to post something about this for a couple of weeks.

Last month, Vaclav Havel, the first Democratically elected president of Czechoslovakia (and the Czech Republic, for that matter) and the father of the 1989 Velvet Revolution that freed Czechosolovakia from Communism.

Overlooked somewhat in the news Victor Havel’s death a few weeks ago is that he died from smoking. Havel, who led the Velvet Revolution that freed Czechoslovakia from Communism, will go down in the history as one of the great champions of Democracy in Europe. I can’t help but notice the irony that this guy had the cajones to stare down the fucking Soviet Union, but wasn’t able to break his addiction to nicotine. He had two surgeries to remove tumours from his lungs a few years ago. Ultimately, he died of COPD.

Havel was 75 and had suffered for years from chronic respiratory ailments. He was a notorious chain smoker, common in Eastern Europe still to this day.

Havel spent years in prison and was the first president of Czechoslovakia and oversaw the peaceful split between the Czech Republican and Slovakia. One of the great leaders of the late 20th Century, taken too young by lung disease and tobacco. He was a great man.

COPD, Lung cancer, Lung disease, Uncategorized

November is National Lung Cancer Awareness Month and National COPD Awareness Month

November 9, 2011 Pepe Lepew

November is both National Lung Cancer Awareness Month and National COPD Awareness Month:

Here’s my contribution to raising awareness

Death toll in 2009
All causes 2.4 million
1) Heart disease 600,000
2) Cancer (other than lung cancer) 400,000
3) Lung cancer (28 percent of all cancer deaths) 160,000
4) Respiratory disease (primarily COPD) 130,000
5) Stroke 128,000
6) Accidents 117,000
7) Alzheimer’s 79,000
8 Diabetes 68,000
9) Flu, pneumonia 53,000
11) Suicide 36,000
13) Chronic liver disease and cirrhosis 30,000
15) Parkinson’s disease 20,000
16) Homicide 16,600

√ So, basically 12 percent of the people who died in 2009, died of lung cancer or COPD. 12 percent. Roughly one death out of eight.
√ Lung cancer is 28 percent of all cancer deaths.
√ Lung cancer and COPD in 2009 killed more people than Alzheimer’s, diabetes, the flu, suicide, cirrhosis of the liver and homicide … combined.
√ 85 to 90 percent of the people who died of lung cancer or COPD were smokers or former smokers, which means they are preventable deaths
√ That means about 250,000 deaths could have been avoided
√ 250,000 is about the population of Lincoln, Neb. or Madison, Wis.
√ Did I mention these were preventable deaths?

COPD, Lung disease, Uncategorized

Danica Patrick joins COPD campaigndrive4

February 24, 2011 Pepe Lepew

I don’t follow car racing (I mean, I don’t follow it with extreme prejudice), but I have of course heard of Danica Patrick — I mean you can’t hardly get away from those Go Daddy! commercials of hers.

Anyway, I saw an ad in this week’s Sports Illustrated with her in it, for a campaign called “Drive4COPD.” I thought that was pretty cool. COPD is a little understood disease that doesn’t get a great deal of publicity even though it kills nearly as many smokers as lung cancer (COPD among non-smokers is exceedingly rare. A lot of people in the mining industry also get it.). The campaign’s symbol is an orange and purple pinwheel.

COPD is a collection of lung function diseases that a few years ago got lumped together in one category — emphysema, chronic bronchitis being the main two. It kills more than 100,000 Americans a year … the No. 4 killer in America.

I went to the web site, I hadn’t heard of it before. The other celebrities involved in the campaign are Patty Loveless, Bruce Jenner and Michael Strahan. The whole point of the campaign is to educate people about COPD and identify more people who are likely suffering it but aren’t even aware of it (symptoms are constant lung and respiratory infections, constantly coughing up gunk, and a chronic cough.)