Former Surgeon General Dies at Age 96

By Alicia Cruz
The Black Urban Times

Photo/Koop Wikipedia

Charles Everett Koop, the 13th former Surgeon General of the United States, has died.

Koop, 96, suffered kidney failure the week before his death and had been ill for sometimes, the Valley news reported. During a news conference in 2010, Koop announced that he was deaf and legally blind.
The Doctor's last days were spent surrounded by family. He died peacefully at his Hanover, New Hampshire home, CNN.com reported.

The former Surgeon General earned his medical degree from Cornell Medical College in 1941. Koop, born in Brooklyn, New York on October 14, 1916 was an only child born to John Everett Koop (1883–1972) and Helen (née Apel) Koop (1894–1970).

On of the more memorable events of Koop's tenure as Surgeon General was his challenge to Americans to "create a smoke-free society in the United States by the year 2000." 

Soon after, he issued more than five reports detailing the health related consequences of tobacco usage as well as the consequences of exposure to second hand smoke. A former pipe smoker, Koop once said that cigarettes were just as addictive as Heroine and Cocaine.

Koop served as the professor of pediatric surgery and, later, professor of pediatrics at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine.

Former President Ronald Reagan appointed Koop as Deputy Assistant Secretary for Health in February 1981.

Koop lost his son, David, in 1968 after a rock climbing accident in New Hampshire. Koop, known to friends and colleagues as "Chick" (as in Chicken Koop), suffered another loss in February 2007 when his wife of more than 60 years, Elizabeth, passed away. He re-married Cora Hogue Koop in April 2010.

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