c. 2006 Religion News Service

WASHINGTON _ Following a groundbreaking conference, some Seventh-day Adventist doctors are talking about upending their now antiquated approach to helping smokers quit their habit.

DeWitt Williams, the director of health for the North American division of the Seventh-day Adventist Church, said that while Adventists have been known for their anti-tobacco stance, for too long the church has lagged behind the rest of the scientific world when it comes to actually fighting tobacco.

Many of the 60-odd health professionals gathered here July 14-16 for the Adventist Global Tobacco Control Summit, expressed the same sentiment. It was the first time such an event has brought together so many voices in the Adventist health community.

“For the Adventist Church, the anti-tobacco commitment runs deep _ it is part of the tradition of our church,” said Charles Sandefur, the president of the Adventist Development Relief Agency.

Adventists, numbering more than 12 million worldwide, root their concern for treating smokers in their doctrinal teachings of “temperance,” which also extend to alcohol and meat. For Adventists, smoking has been regarded as unhealthy since the 1850s, when an Adventist doctor warned of the dangerous “toxins” in cigarettes.

Adventists developed some of the world’s first effective treatments in the late 1950s, long before most of the rest of the planet agreed on the perils of lighting up. But while the mainstream medical community has raced ahead with a dizzying array of treatments since then, including a new non-nicotine medication for tobacco addiction due out on July 24, Adventist treatment programs have stagnated.

“I don’t think we’ve ever talked about it before,” Williams said. “That’s why this is important. We haven’t talked _ we’ve kind of rested on our laurels.”

Dr. Harley Stanton, a World Health Organization consultant who has traveled to more than 65 countries, noted that the conference forced the church to confront its “discomfort zone.”

“If the church is just a place where people are cloistered for a few hours a week and has no impact on the community, that’s not really what church is about,” said Stanton, who is a Seventh-day Adventist.

Change can start with simple programs, Stanton said, pointing to an initiative in Philadelphia to encourage people to improve their diets and be more physically active. The same concept can be applied to public education on smoking, he said, and there is no reason Adventists can’t take the lead with the church’s global reach.

The meeting was a time for doctors and public health officials to share what has worked _ and what hasn’t _ in different parts of the world.

Dr. Kong Mom, a public health professional in Cambodia, shared his experiences launching a broad public education campaign in the country to keep people from smoking.

The nation has also had success with a psychological treatment program for smokers, though he said Cambodia is too poor to afford nicotine treatment options like patches and gum, which are readily available in the United States and Europe.

During his presentation to the conference, Dr. Greg Wise, a church member and director at the Kettering Medical Center Network in Dayton, Ohio, chastised the Adventist Church for losing sight of the importance of fighting tobacco usage.

“Members in general are not passionate,” he said, adding that many congregations are apathetic and fatigued after being drawn into so many causes, from homelessness and poverty to the global spread of AIDS.

“We have to consider the reality of economics in the equation, but there is never any substitute for compassion,” Wise said.

DSB/JL END SACHS