sample="rhetorical" bates="TIMN 396077" isource="ti" decade="1960" class="ui" date="19610316" TOBACCO AND THE HEALTH OF A NATION (Revised Draft - With Changes Suggested By Counsel When Europeans discovered America nearly 400 years ago, they also discovered tobacco. In the centuries since, tobacco has given pleasure and relaxation to people throughout the world. For centuries before, native Indians had given tobacco a place in their social and economic lives, and even in their ceremonial rites. Over 100 years ago, one medical publication described tobacco as "the solace of life." As with most pleasures of life, this solace has never been without its opponents. Probably no single plant in our vegetable kingdom has had so many songs and words of praise sung for it! Nor as many diatribes shouted against it! LEAF ONCE CALLED "DIVINE HERB" If we were to believe that all that has been said we could think tobacco to be the "divine herb" -- a cure for all man's ills. Or we could believe it to be the bane of mankind and would wonder what ailed man before tobacco was ever used by him! Tobacco, especially in its most popular form, the cigarette, has recently been singled out for much attention as a possible suspect in lung cancer and heart disease. These claims have Stat. attracted continuing publicity, but less attention has been given 1 to reports of a divergent point of view. In each, the proposed additions or modifications are underscored. Not long ago claims for . Today, headlines are frequently given to cancer cause" has been found. Unfortunately, for cancer has yet been established. But have sought to indicate a statistical relationship and lung cancer However, neither the cause of cancer has been established by either laboratory or clinic. Year after year, tens of millions spent in scientific efforts to find the causes cancer. Many Organizations such as the American Cancer National Institute of Health and the Tobacco are devoting large sums each year for this, Tobacco Institute was established by the tobacco for the dissemination of information about tobacco whose daily bread is derived from tobacco are, to be, mos st directly concerned with tobacco and else. This pamphlet gives a few facts of the nation's health and about the continuing into tobacco use and health. HOW IS THE NATION'S HEALTH? General health and 4 To get a complete picture of and longer life of the American people, many considered. Diseases that formerly took lives are now curable. This means people are living much longer to become subject to causes of death that were not common a few decades ago. TOLL FROM LUNG ILLS DECLINE Medical advances in the past half-century have helped to cut death rates from lung ailments to about one-seventh of what they were in 1900. This chart shows the trend in reported death rates 5 from major lung diseases, including lung cancer: [Chart Omitted] Part of this has been due to the discovery of the cause and cure of lung tuberculosis -- a disease which was sometimes attributed to smoking until the real cause was found to be the tuberculosis germ. Many scientists believe there may be a connection between the fall of deaths from tuberculosis, pneumonia and influenza and the rise in reported lung cancer deaths. Many studies indicate show that lung-cancer deaths in the past actually 6 were recorded in the past as being as resulting from lung cancer were more likely due to a different respiratory or other disease. Of the increase in reported lung cancer deaths in recent decades, a leading insurance actuary reported: "Approximately half this increase reflects merely the growth and aging of the population, and a considerable part of the remainder represents improved diagnosis and more complete case finding." WHAT ABOUT LUNG CANCER Lung cancer has been known for hundreds of years. Many scientists and doctors think the increased number of cases being reported is more apparent than real. They give many reasons: More people are living to the cancer-prone age than before. There are better diagnoses, better medical tests and improved equipment to find out what is really wrong with a patient. Death recording has become more accurate. Doctors have become more aware of this disease and look for it more often. Out of 1,633,178 deaths during 1957 in the U. S. there were there were 30,776, or about 1.8% of the total, have been attributed to cancer fo the lung and bronchus. Of these, 14,617 were reported 7 as originating in the lung. It was not recorded how many of the other 16,159 began in another part of the body and, as frequently happens, eventually spread to the lungs. CAUSES OF LUNG CANCER NOT YET KNOWN Millions of dollars have been spent in the past few years in research on lung cancer. The answer still is not know, any more than it is known about other types of cancer. Still doctors 8 do not agree on what causes lung cancer, just as they cannot agree on the origins of many other types of cancer. Tobacco use has been publicized as one suspect factor. However, People who never smoke get lung cancer. Most smokers never get lung cancer. 9 (Later figures to be inserted) These two facts are often cited to show that the problem of lung cancer is much more complex and probably has no simple, single answer. Smoking began to get attention when some statistics showed that the use of cigarettes increased about the time of an increase in recorded lung cancer deaths. Scientific researchers are trying to find out whether there is a connection between these coincidental developments. 10 WHAT ABOUT STATISTICAL STUDIES? Top-rated medical statisticians have questioned the meaning and validity of several statistical studies claiming to show that lung cancer is more likely to occur in smokers than in non-smokers. Other statistical studies have reported associations between more frequent lung cancer incidence and a number of factors such as previous medical history, occupation, economic level, urban air pollution, and even place of birth or early life. Scientists generally agree that statistical associations Stat are not sufficient to prove a cause and effect relationship, although statistical reports often do not make this fact clear. Statistical associations do not of themselves prove cause and effect. Because two events happen at the same time does not establish that they are in any way related to each other, or that one causes the other. The fact that after a spring shower frogs invariably appear on the banks of a river, does not prove that it has rained frogs. 11 l