sample="supplemental" bates="2501343358" isource="pm" decade="1990" class="ue" date="19900923"
TN1052 Sent to New England Journal 3/9/90 LUNG CANCER AND EXPOSURE
TO TOBACCO SMOKE IN THE HOUSEHOLD. To the Editor: Dr. Janerich and
his colleaguesı report a statistically significant increased risk
of lung cancer (odds ratio 2.07; 95% confidence interval, 1.16 to
3.38) in men and women who had never smoked but were exposed to 25
or more smoker-years during childhood and adolescence. Although there
was no statistically significant increased risk for all never smoking
men and women exposed during childhood and adolescence, they suggest
that early life environmental tobacco smoke exposure increases risk
of lung cancer. This suggestion is unconvincing for a number of reasons.
First, it ignores by now quite extensive epidemiological evidence
showing a complete lack of association between ETS exposure in childhood
and risk of lung cancer. As shown in Table 1, relative risk estimates
from 11 studies, many involving substantial number of cases and controls,
are all non-significant, with as many estimates less than 1.0 as are
greater than 1.0. Second, the significance of their reported association
is not strong (0.01