Superman's widow joins US election fight
Dana Reeve endorses Senator Kerry
Dana Reeve and Hillary Clinton:
Posted on 03/07/2006 10:12:12 PM PST by Extremely Extreme Extremist
Did years of singing in smoky nightclubs kill Dana Reeve, the widow of paralysed Superman actor Christopher Reeve?
She died yesterday of lung cancer even though she was not a smoker.
"Ten to 15 per cent of people who develop lung cancer are thought to be non-smokers. It was said that she had, in the course of being an entertainer, spent a lot of time in pubs, in nightclubs, in which there is a lot of cigarette smoke," said Dr James Mulshine from Rush University Medical Centre in Chicago.
Reeve, 44, won worldwide admiration for her devotion to her husband through his decade of near total paralysis.
He died 15 months ago and late last year she appeared at a gala for the Christopher Reeve Foundation and appeared to be responding well to treatment.
In the US more women die of lung cancer than breast cancer, and one in five American women diagnosed with the disease have never lit a cigarette.
"We know that 90 per cent of lung cancer is linked to direct smoking, the other 10 per cent is tied to occupational exposures, radon and secondhand smoke," said Pat McKone, a senior director of tobacco control with the American Lung Association.
"Dana Reeve was not a smoker, but she did spend many years of her singing career in smoke filled nightclubs."
Her death comes amid a worldwide debate on the danger of passive smoking and attempts to ban smoking from bars, clubs and eateries.
For instance today in New Jersey a coalition of bars, restaurants and bowling alley operators sued the state claiming its ban on smoking law is unconstitutional.
Meanwhile tributes have poured in for Reeve who was best known for standing by her husband through his courageous decade-long battle with paralysis caused by a fall from a horse.
"The brightest light has gone out," said comedian Robin Williams, one of the couple's closest friends. "We will forever celebrate her loving spirit."
Reeve's death came as a shock because she seemed to have the upper hand on the deadly disease since telling the world about her diagnosis last year, only two days after the death of American ABC TV newsman Peter Jennings.
"I'm beating the odds and defying every statistic the doctors can throw at me," Reeve said just a few months ago.
Reeve said she had learned from her late husband's struggle.
"I was married to a man who never gave up," she said.
Her death sparked an outpouring from the Reeves' many friends and admirers in Hollywood and Washington, where she was a vocal backer of stem cell research.
Former president Bill Clinton and Senator Hillary Clinton described Reeve as "a model of tenacity and grace".
"Chris was America's superhero, and Dana became our hero, too," added former presidential candidate Senator John Kerry, a close family friend.
Dana Reeve is survived by her 13-year-old son Will and two adult stepchildren, Matthew and Alexandra.
Dana Reeve, who lived in Pound Ridge, New York, had appeared in Broadway and Off-Broadway productions and on the TV shows Law & Order, Oz and All My Children.
She married Reeve in 1992 and abandoned her acting career to care for him after he was paralysed when he fell from a horse in 1995.
Christopher Reeve died on October 10, 2004.
In his autobiography, Still Me, Reeve wrote that he suggested early on to his wife, "Maybe we should let me go."
She responded, "I'll be with you for the long haul, no matter what. You're still you and I love you."
Those were "the words that saved my life", he wrote.
Kerry is a stooge, but there are also Two Americas. One in which the privileged don't have to suffer the indignity of working in a sweat shop filled with second hand smoke. The other is the one in which the poor are forced to work at Wal-Mart where they stand at the door, greeting people that are exinguishing their cigarettes.
And this all could've been prevented if they'd have been elected, approved embryonic stem cell research and created One America where we're all the same.
:-)
Superman's widow joins US election fight
Dana Reeve endorses Senator Kerry
Dana Reeve and Hillary Clinton:
What did Bush know and when did he know it? You've got to get to the bottom of it, P. America is counting on you lobby for impeachment articles. We can't have people dying of lung cancer.
:-)
On "Nightline" tonight they said that lumg cancer research got less financial support because it is perceived to be caused by behavior. There's a stigma attached to it. So why does AIDS get so much support?
but look at poor George Burns, with his always present cigar, he died at such a young age...LOL
When I was a young kid, my mom and step-dad used to take me to alcaholics anonymous meatings. In those meetings the attendees smoked like fiends. I can remember vividly some forty years later a layer of smoke about six inches thick about four feet off the floor.
Ask a fireman what the number one killer is in fires. It isn't the heat or being burned alive. Smoke is the killer.
I know this is a contentious subject on this forum. I know that figures are overblown by both sides to prove points. I'm not here to say that one side is totally right and the other totally wrong.
If I have a choice to make, it will be to avoid smoke filled rooms. If I have to weigh which is more safe, the room absent the smoke is the one I'd have to assess being more safe.
Whole thing's bulls**t. Forget facts or science......
This was the lead story on ABC and NBC news. Why?
I think she got it from breathing Liberal air in a Liberal State . . .
Yeah, and Jimmy Fixx literally ran himself into the ground, along with that guy who invented those Powerbars. Unbelievable.
We don't know for 100% what caused Mrs. Reeve's lung cancer, but second-hand is not bullcrap, it did kill my grand-aunt who was in a house full of smokers and never once fired one up herself. At least she lived to almost 90.
Because she was a Kerry supporter and they could use her. Lung cancer hits people with no risk factors,too. Sadly, the major news media will use her death to push their agenda for no second hand smoke anywhere, stem cell research, blah, blah, blah.... I am also a non-smoker but believe the truth is more important than the agenda.
Amen. Some people just will never admit that smoking kills.May be legal, but it is deadly. My dad smoked 4 packs a day for years, mom never did. BOTH died from lung cancer.
There is no comparison between tobacco smoke found in even the smokiest of bars or nightclubs and the smoke found in a typical house fire. If you want to ask a firefighter (which is what they prefer to be called) about this, you just did.
The heck it ain't. Even the WHO (no, not the rock band) debunked second-hand smoke years ago.
it did kill my grand-aunt who was in a house full of smokers and never once fired one up herself. At least she lived to almost 90
But she lived a relatively long life though, so that point is moot.
So you are saying it was more likely second hand BS from her peers than second hand smoke? I think you may have a point, I do know much of their BS makes me very ill.
That was the cause of her lung cancer, and her physician and medical examiner concurred.
"But she lived a relatively long life though, so that point is moot."
The point is that her physicians expected her to live to 100, and were it not for her exposure to decades of second-hand smoke (mind you, even 20 years after she was hardly around any), she would not have died of lung cancer. The irony is that her brother-in-law, my grandfather, smoked for nearly 70 years (from the time he was a child), and suffered absolutely no ill-effects whatsoever from his habit.
Good question, maybe because there is no group raising cain on behalf of smokers, demanding money to cure lung cancer. Hollywood doesn't promote/condone smoking so there little publicity for smokers. Smokers as a group don't have parades either, or a Smoker's Pride Day. Schools don't teach that smoking is only an alternate lifestyle either. Hmmmmm...
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