Tobacco Documents Online

a M ® EER i '.s 1 THE NEW YORK TIMES' New York, N. Y. January 19, 1967 Smoking and Health To the Editorc I was surprised and dtstp- ctgarettes,. Yet to arrive at pointed by The Times editorial this lnflated figure the couneiloL Dec. 28 "11tan-~fade Eptdem- obviously included all cancers !c" which appears to lack the whleh originated in some other objectivity one hopes for tn t of the body and spread to pour newspaper. ~ t~ lungs (Clarification No: For example, the tdltorlal 163) and then projected a liber- acema to attribute.substanUallg ~ increaae in~both figures since the entire lung cancer problem the 1964 vital statlstiCs. While to cigarette smoking, even this ~ effective anti-cigarette: ceded thonghh it that is many universallyy con- nonsmokers propaganda, lt.is most mislead- . . get this disease and only a very Ing' " - - - small porcentageofeven heavy Other 'Suspccts• . - smokers gett it . t- 1am.sure you will agree that. Statistics on Death. .'' any tendency to treat cigarettes Again,I questiomyour use of as the sole or principal cause of ' the word "epidemic:' The.lastlung cancer grants a reprieve published official United States to the host of other "suspects" vital statisti@s were for the year such as constitutional factors 1964. Theyy show (Classification of the individual, viruses, . airNo.162). 19,772deaths during pollution, genetics and prior thatt year from cancers which respiratory disease and makes. were specified as having orig- tt difficult totnterest: able faated in, the lung, tracNea,6 or scientists in searching for the bronchus. This was an increase real causes. of.906 over comparable deaths Even though various theories two years before and reflected for convicting cigarettes have the tncreasein our population.been tested and abandoned,. it In that same two-yearperiod Ls still the popular approach to the death rate per 100,000 of contrive neww theories and hy- population from these same dis- potheses (nvolvingcigarettes eases inereased from 10.2 to rather than to suspect and in- 103persons. Certainlyy this cann vestigate other possible causes. hardly be considered an "epi-Th(s approach is certainly nur- demic." The National Advisory Can- eer Councll~ (n the report re-, terred to in the editorial (whirhI understand was Its firstt re- port in thee nearlyy thirty years of its existenee),..bas placed the current annual mortality from lung cancer alone at approxi- mately S0,oo0. Both . the Advi- sory Council and your editorial blame suhstantlallyanof it on tured bysachthings as the exaggerbtedreport of the Ad- visory Council and your edi- torial of Dec. 28. - I plead for aa return too ob- jectivity on the subject of smoking and health. JossrH F. Cttu,xat;, 3d Chairman of the Board Philip Morris,.Ine. New York, Jaa. 12, 1966. M4 t. • r grd THE NEW YORK TIMES New York, N. Y. ,,January 30, 1967 Smoking and Health To the Editor: The Jaa.19 letter on smoking and health from Joseph F..Cull+ man 3d,~ chairman of the board. . Philp Morris, Ina,, contained sufftc(ent faulty reasoning and . miainformatton to merit a sarl- ous reply. First to the faulty x,ereaning: Mr. Cullman suggests thatt thee very euteasivee evidence pointing-.tncigarette smoking as the leadlag cauaee of lung cancer is gravely weakened by the observation that thb dis- ease develops among only a small' percentage of heavy smokers and occasionally occurs innonsmokera .. . Greater Cancer Risk No one is suggesting that smoking is the onlycavse off lung cancer or thatievery heavy smoker will invariably be stricken-any morethan every person who driaka contaminated watee will develop typhoid tever, or all who come in con- tact with a case . of smallpox will contract the disease. But clearly these exceptlona in no way invalidate the fact that, on the avarage, the heavy amoker stands a4t a far higher risk of developing lung eancer than the nonsmoker as, on the average, drinkers of polhrtedwatea wllll have more typhoid.fever than those who have a pure supplR and those who brush against a ®alapoxx victim will be at a __ hfgherrlsk of developing small•: poz than thosae who have no such contact:. . The most persuasive piece of ~.. evidence pointing to the dga- -:M netb as the major cause of our ever-axpandtng lung cancer ept. demic Mr. Cullman, understand- - ably, failed to mention-antd , '. that is the stark and dz.matlo " hct that when one etopa IInok ~ fng hit risk of developing lung cancer drops, and drops dra ,. matically- And speaking of ept- 30 denztc - the Amerlcan Public Health Aaeociat(on e.fimatea that If present emoking tixnds cotttinue, onee million of-.today't ' school-age ctWdem will d(e pre• . , matunely of lung eancer--ae ••epidemic" by any man'i dePld- tien, Lvldenee Aeoeptad 72 z ~ RegaMingg themiainforma- tion: Mr. Cullman states that . the National~. Advisory Cancer Council estimate of50,000 an- mud deaths from lung cancer is . an inflated and . fnaccurate fig- ure because,, in combining . Classification 163 with 162, can- cers other than . primary )nng _ cancer (L a., cancers originating in otherareaa ofthe body and spreading totbe lungs)) havebeea, counted. This question bas been settled for some time aow- In a detailed shudy by the ffi- ometrp Branch of, the Natlonal . Cancer Institute It was fousid that 96.1 per cent of the daaths inCtaaalIIcation 163 eaen due ~ to priamry lung cancea-a facG. ~~ may veriffed, 1t ona ; 1Sshed h~ ngrs ( Cggare the ~ tte Li. belingand Adverti9ing-196S). . of the House of Representatfves .' Intersfate and Foreign Cosa maice Committee. .. ". It seems a shame that (n the S.fau of the aecepfance by an overwhelming majority of the medical professfonin this coun- : ~try.and abroad oftheevidenw estatAishLtgcigarette smoking as the chief cause of lung ean- cer there remain those who eon-- t(nue to cloud the issuee and --- createdoubt and confuaion In t4 the mtad of the pubt/a -. -•-.,, s I join wlth Mr. C.~llmaa la hta ;.~ ealufor a return to obJectlvity, by all parttea, on the subject of smoking and health. . DoNAta T. FaIDStcxsON, M.D. ,oor Rg"$t<rvR i. D(reetor Smoktng Control Progtam Department of. Health New York, Jan. 23,1967; . ~..~ c.~..._.., _. . _ N