Source: San Jose Mercury News (CA) Author: Allen G. Breed, Associated Press Contact: Website: http://www.sjmercury.com/ Pubdate: Sun, 28 Jun 1998 PHYSICIANS GROWING TONS OF TOBACCO For Many, It's A Matter Of Tradition And Business RALEIGH, N.C. - HUNDREDS OF doctors across the country own and profit from tons of tobacco, despite decades of health warnings, scoldings from peers, and in some cases, their own ethical reservations. They're family practitioners who warn teenagers not to smoke, psychiatrists who treat addiction, oncologists who identify malignant tumors and surgeons who remove them. One tobacco-owning doctor was a longtime regional medical director for the American Cancer Society. Another runs a public-health department. A third writes a newspaper column on health tips. Few of them smoke. ``I won't smoke,'' says Stephen Jackson, an orthopedic surgeon in Paducah, Ky., who co-owns the government rights to grow 1,400 pounds of burley tobacco a year. ``I mean, it will kill you.'' All tell their patients not to smoke or chew tobacco. ``I get mad with them, fuss at them every day,'' says Richard Rush, a family practitioner from Conway, S.C., with more than 11,000 pounds of flue-cured tobacco allotted to his farm. Nonetheless, they are among at least 760 doctors and other health-care workers who own valuable federal tobacco-growing rights, known as allotments or quotas, according to a computer analysis by the Associated Press. They practice in 23 states, from Florida to Alaska, Massachusetts to California. Some of the doctors own minuscule government rights, as little as 21 pounds annually; one in South Carolina has 932,000 pounds. All told, these doctors control production of more than 7 million pounds of tobacco -- enough to make 193 million packs of cigarettes a year. They also grow nearly 290,000 pounds of the varieties of leaf used in chewing tobacco and cigar wrappers. At last year's sales prices, their leaf would be worth $13 million -- although a large portion of that goes to family members, sharecroppers and those who lease much of the crop. For professionals who have taken an oath not to do harm, those numbers are ``shocking and disappointing,'' medical ethicist Arthur Caplan says. ``I think you just cannot argue that you're going to make money on the back of this obvious health menace,'' says Caplan, director of the Center for Bioethics at the University of Pennsylvania. ``To own and farm and produce tobacco as a doctor, especially in small communities, sends a resoundingly wrong message.'' THE FACT that many of these doctors grew up in those small communities is often their reason for being involved in tobacco. Even so, some are uneasy about it. Dr. Edwin Norris has no doubt that a three-pack-a-day habit hastened his father's death at age 53 from coronary disease. And the Mountain City, Tenn., general practitioner and cosmetic surgeon has little doubt that tobacco produced under his 1,925-pound quota is harming other people's fathers. ``Even though it's legal,'' Norris says, ``we're still responsible for some of the effects of it.'' His explanation for keeping the tobacco: Neighbors who actually raise it for him need the poundage to make a living. Other physicians bought their farms as investments and acknowledge tobacco proceeds contribute to their wealth. Although they may only get a nickel to 15 cents a pound for leasing their tobacco rights to farmers, quotas help pay mortgages and add to the land's assessed value. With talk in Washington about possible $8-a-pound federal tobacco buyouts some day, the leaf could constitute an even more valuable asset. ``I'm too greedy,'' George Burrus, a cardiovascular surgeon in Nashville, Tenn., says when asked about his decision to keep his 6,500-pound quota, even though he says he knows tobacco is ``killing people.'' He clears about $4,000 a year from leasing his leaf. ``I don't worry about it enough to (sell out) since I don't feel like, say, the guy that's raising dope.'' The AP identified these doctors by cross-checking a federal farm database with medical rosters from tobacco states. To verify matches, the AP contacted scores of physicians by telephone. Some hung up when they heard the word ``tobacco.'' Most who stayed on the line expressed ambivalence. ``Absolutely schizophrenic'' is how Dr. William Grigsby described the notion of physicians growing tobacco. ``It's crazy, but I'll tell you why we do it,'' says the general surgeon from Kingsport, Tenn., who owns about 3,700 pounds of quota. ``Almost the only doctors who raise tobacco have grown up on the farm and have the kinfolks there.'' ONE IS Richard Calhoun. He was raised on a tobacco farm, and tobacco money helped put him through college and medical school. On Wednesdays, when other doctors hit the golf course, Calhoun dons bib overalls and a baseball cap and drives a beat-up red flatbed truck around his mountainside farm in western North Carolina. He raises hay, cattle, Christmas trees and about 7,000 pounds of burley. ``Tobacco is a proud heritage for North Carolina,'' says Calhoun, who practices in Jefferson, near the Tennessee line. ``I want to maintain that part of my heritage.'' He knows the links between the crop he grows and diseases he treats, from cancer to heart disease. Is that inconsistent? ``I do feel that tobacco is harmful to one's health,'' Calhoun replies. ``But more important than that, I feel that, as citizens of the United States, we have the freedom of choice. And I don't think that governmental regulation should infringe upon one's ability to make choices in this regard.'' - --- Checked-by: Richard Lake