Tobacco Documents Online

officers, medical societies and other health groups." Base.d on the data accumulated by the Society, the Group Study Report and the 1957 U.S: Public Health Service statement, the Sopiety's Board of Directors, at its annual meeting in New York, in, November,1957 , urged all public health. agencies to take "s~xch measures" to protect health as might be indicated by present knowledge of cigars ettes and lung cancer. Also in 1957, the Board of Directors of the_Society . . ~. . . es~ablished an Ad Hoc Committee on Smoking and Health. Its menihers were: Dr. Warren H. Cole, off the Universi.ty' of Illinois College of Medicinex Dr. Johri R. HelJ.er, then Director of the National Cancer Institute; Dr. Ochsner; Dr. Ernest L. Stebbins, of Johns Hopkins, Uni'versity; Dr. Howard C. Taylor, Jr., Professor r. an'd Chairman of th^. Department of Obstetrics and Gynecoloky, Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons; Ruth~erford , L. Ellis, Cha%rman of the Board of Lip'scomb-Ellis Co,, Atlanta, Ga.; William B. Lewis, Chairman of the Board of Kenyon & Eckhardt, Inc., New York City; Monroe J. Rathbone, Presi'dent and Director of Standard Oil of NPw Jersb,yg Dr. Ira DeA. H'eidj' Professor of Sociology, Itaverforc; College, 'and Frank L. Taylor, Executive Vice President and Di.rector. of the 'New York Herald Tribune. The Society rAaffi.rmed the importance of presenting-basic findinrs on thn link between cigarPtt(,s and lung cancer to the piib].ic. Thn Board aiithorizPd rrodi:cti.on of suitable educational matrria) s, i ncliidinP materials designed specifically for';h hirh schooJl and col1i-Fo st.>>dnnts, and authorized a one-year stlid,y of the smoking

-12- habits of teen-agers in the.Por-tland, Oregon, school system • which would involve nearly 22,000 high school students. Action foAlowed. In December of 1957, the Society began distribution of its leaflet, "To Smoke Or Not To Smoke." The leaflet pointed out that "to smoke or not to smoke is a personal decision" and that the purpose of the pamphlet was to give the public "the information available as of today." Among the things the . leaflet "pointed out was that "a man who smokes two packs -a, day has about one chance in ten of developing lung cancer, while a non-smoker-has only about one in 270 of having this disease." Since•publication of the pam~hlet more than five million copies have been distributed. In late 1957, the Society moved "to bring directly to , the attention of the physician" evidence in the field of lung cancer and smoking as it develops. As a result, in 1958, the Society released an exhibit for the medical profession entitled "Smoking:and Lung Cancer" and devoted an issue of "CA," its journall for physicians, to the problem. Another important development of this period should be noted: the presentation at the Seventh International Cancer Congress in London in 1958 by the late Dr. Harold F. Dorn of the National Institutes of Health of his remarkable prospective study of -the smoking habits of 249,000 war veterans holding government life insurance policies. The findings of this impressive piece of research further documented the relation of cigarette consumption to mortality from cancer and other diseases. Zn.1958, the study of the smoking habits,,of high school students in Portland, Oregon, was begun under the direction of Dr. Daniel Horn. It revealed, when completed in 1959, that whether or not hia,h school students smoke depends to a marked derree on the smoking habits of their parents. His study found the percentape of smokers was highest among children in which