Tobacco Documents Online

I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I Selected quotes from CRS report on ETS I. Overall vicw c.:n F.7 iri test'_:r.ony beFcre 7enar_e panel: In testimony before a Senate subcommittee, CRS concluded that "the atatistical evidence does not appear to :3upport a conclusioi: that there are substant:.al. health eflects of passive 9mokir.g. "p7 II. Statements regarding wozkplace/~)ublic exposure to ETS (the area with the only clear public policy impli.c.•atior.) : "OSHA based its risk assessment on a workplace risk estimate by Fnntham et.al., which indicated an increased i~•isk, 3nd chose not to use the remaining estimates which found no overall asgociat~on between workplace exposure and lung cancer."p±-4 y "OSHA concluded that the ETS lsng cancer risk ranges from 1.20 to 1.50. It did not provide any explanati.on of how it arrived at this estimate ... nor did it irtd~cate what this risk is relative to. "p61 ~ "Therefore, had OSHA performed a meta-analysis, it eeems likely that it would have found no increased lung cancer risk from occupational ETS exposure."p62 (emphasis addect) "For a person exposed only to background FTS, the [chance of dying off lung cancer from the ETS over a lifetime] number drops Lo about. 7/100 of one percent." p2 (Lmphasis added) III. Question marks about EPA science, which undermines the findings even in the extreme cases: pEven at the greatest integrated exposure levels, the measured risks are still subject to uncertainty." p2 (omphasis added) "One implication of the potential disparity between the different t~pe9 of exposure measurements is that combininq risk assessments o several ctudieo at the highest exposure levels probably yields misleading reeults."p31 "Thp calnulationa prPaanrad above are just a aample of the very large number of misclassification rate combinations possible in these ETS studies. It seems clear from those results, however, that possible combinations of small rates -- below 10 percent -- could drive ETS relative risks in the highest exposure zoups to u psn a study values no longer distinct from 1.0 (or no risk], even i gz o that produces relatively hiqh risks. While r.hE.se resulLs were obtained from the Fontham study , similar resulc.~3 are likely from the Brownson study . Even smaller values of these rates .-- below 3 percent -- could be combined to reduce the Lower bounds of the 95 percent confidence intervals well below *: . cy for these ~ studies." p40 (emphasis added) c, 42. ~ "These si,mt:lar..ed calculations indicate that misc-l.assifi.c.ation can be a pot.r:nr uncertainty ir: these ETS epi aind c(ould t~ account f,or thc mca3urcd risk valuee."p3 4 .Pa

I r I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I "It is clear that misclassification and recall bias plague ETS epidemiology studies. It is also clear Er.om the simulations t:ac modest, possJble misclassS.Cic:a~..los1 dLui r,-c:all bia:+ rates cai-1 char__e the measured relative risk results, po9sibly in dramatic ways."p45 (emphasis added) IV. What CP.O says about the plausibility of F..TS involvcmcnt with heart disease: "WharEas EPA' a estimate of the ETS-relatpo lunrl cancer risk (RRa = 1.19) among never-smoking women is a small fraction (2 percent) of the lunq cancer risk for ever-smoking women (RR = 11) , wells' est imate of the ETS-re1 arP(3 haart r3; qiaqr,~ ri sk i.^, alnaost: one- __ third of the risk among ever smokers. Because ot these relationships, some investigators have questioned the biological plausibility of the passive smoking heart disease risk estimates."p67 (emphasis added) "Further indications that these results may be too large are found in the publication of two large new studies that found no risk of heart disease from passive smoking."p6e (emphasis added) 0 W I I