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I I I I I I I I 1 I I I I I I I I I SprinFt, ,Brien The Times 9th March 1998 No link bctwecn passivc smakin g and lun . canccr ~ By NIGEL HAWKES. SCIENCE EDITOR A TEN-YEAR study carried uut for the World Health . Urganisation has failed to find s a clear link berween passive smoking and lung cancer. The results of the study, the largest in Europe, hint that those who live or work with smokers have slightly elevated rtsks. Bur the margins of error are so wide that no clear conclusion can be drawn. The study, by the Interna- tional Agency for Research on Cancer, compared 650 lung cancer patients with 1,542 healthy people in seven Euro- pean countries. The results were expressed as "risk ra- tios", where the normal risk for a non-smoker of contract- ing lung cancer is set at one. L"xposure to tobacco smoke in the home raised the risk to 1.10, and to smoke in the workplace to 1.17. This repre• sents a fb or 17 per cent uldrease. But the range of error is wide. from 0.93 to 1.4-4 in the case of exposure in the home, meaning that the fig- ures imply anything between a slightly reduced risk and a modestly increased one. Many previous studies have also failed to show convincing- ly that passive smoking in- creases cancer risks. Chris Proctor, head of science for British American Tobacco, said: "While smoking may annoy some non-smokers, the science does not show that being around a smoker is a lung cancer risk." Professor Gordon Mcvie, director-general of the Cancer Research Campaign, accused BAT of launching a spoiling operation ahead of this week's national No Smoking Day, on Wednesday, and publication of a government report on passive smoking. "The weight of the statistics show that there is more likely to be an effect than not to be an effect." 0 The Governntent's Scientif- ic Committee on Smoking and Health is expected to say that passive smoking does pose increased risks, ind b:Lck greater curbs on sm~..::1g in public places. '' .vrxa n ~'TxdS 90CT C84 TLTO YV3 gT:ST \OW 88. COiB(