C. Everett Koop, who raised the profile of the surgeon general by riveting America's attention on the then-emerging disease known as AIDS and by railing against smoking, has died in New Hampshire at age 96.
The Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth said in a release that Koop died peacefully in his home in Hanover on Monday. They did not disclose a cause of death
Koop wielded the previously low-profile post of surgeon general as a bully pulpit for seven years during the Reagan and George H.W. Bush administrations.
An evangelical Christian, he shocked his conservative supporters when he endorsed condoms and sex education to stop the spread of AIDS.
He carried out a crusade to end smoking in the United States -- his goal had been to do so by the year 2000. A former pipe smoker, he said cigarettes were as addictive as heroin and cocaine.
Koop's impact was great, although the surgeon general has no real authority to set government policy. He described himself as "the health conscience of the country."
"My only influence was through moral suasion," Koop said just before leaving office in 1989. By then, his Amish-style silver beard and white, braided uniform were instantly recognizable.
Out of office, he switched to business suits and bow ties, but continued to promote public health causes, from preventing childhood accidents to better training for doctors.
"I will use the written word, the spoken word and whatever I can in the electronic media to deliver health messages to this country as long as people will listen," he promised.
In 1996, he rapped Republican hopeful Bob Dole for suggesting that tobacco is not invariably addictive, saying Dole's comments "either exposed his abysmal lack of knowledge of nicotine addiction or his blind support of the tobacco industry."
Although he eventually won wide respect with his blend of old-fashioned values, pragmatism and empathy, Koop's nomination in 1981 met a wall of opposition from women's groups and liberal politicians.
Critics said President Reagan selected Koop, a pediatric surgeon from Philadelphia, only because of his conservative views -- especially his staunch opposition to abortion.
Foes noted that Koop traveled the country in 1979 and 1980 giving speeches that predicted a progression "from liberalized abortion to infanticide to passive euthanasia to active euthanasia, indeed to the very beginnings of the political climate that led to Auschwitz, Dachau and Belsen."
But Koop, a devout Presbyterian, was confirmed after he told a Senate panel he would not use the surgeon general's post to promote his religious ideology. He kept his word.
In 1986, he issued a frank report on AIDS, urging the use of condoms for "safe sex" and advocating sex education as early as third grade.
He also maneuvered around uncooperative Reagan administration officials in 1988 to send an educational AIDS pamphlet to more than 100 million U.S. households -- the largest public health mailing ever done.
Koop personally opposed homosexuality and believed sex should be saved for marriage. But he insisted that Americans, especially young people, must not die because they were deprived of explicit information about how the HIV virus was transmitted.
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Former Surgeon General C. Everett Koop dies at 96
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Former Surgeon General C. Everett Koop dies at 96
