Richard Doll Quotes

The risk of developing carcinoma of the lung increases steadily as the amount smoked increases. If the risk among non-smokers is taken as unity and the resulting ratios in the three age groups in which a large number of patients were interviewed (ages 45 to 74) are averaged, the relative risks become 6, 19, 26, 49, and 65 when the number of cigarettes smoked a day are 3, 10, 20, 35, and, say, 60-that is, the mid-points of each smoking group. In other words, on the admittedly speculative assumptions we have made, the risk seems to vary in approximately simple proportion with the amount smoked.

Basic research is not the same as development. A crash programme for the latter may be successful; but for the former it is like trying to make nine women pregnant at once in the hope of getting a baby in a month's time.

Up to 10% of childhood cancers are caused by radiological examination during pregnancy.