Russell, Prof. M.A.H. (Michael Anthony Hamilton), FRCP
(Nicotine addiction expert) Institute of Psychiatry, Addiction Research Unit, Bethlem & Mausley Hospital, London, EnglandBiographical Information:
Michael Anthony Hamilton Russell was born in 1932, the eldest of five children of James Hamilton Russell and Kathleen Mary Gibson, both of whose lineages are traced in Burke’s Peerage. But he used the simpler cognomen of M. A. H. Russell when conducting the research on nicotine that made him a central figure first in the controversy over whether smoking is addictive and later in efforts to develop a safer cigarette.
Russell earned a Master of Arts, a Bachelor of Medicine and a Bachelor of Surgery from Oxford, and was then invested as a Fellow in both the Royal College of Physicians and the Royal College of Psychiatrists. He joined the staff of the Addiction Research Unit at London’s Institute of Psychiatry, affiliated with Maudsley Hospital and by the 1960s nicotine had become central to his research. In the years that followed, Russell became known for both his authoritative research and for his willingness to examine smoking and addiction from every possible angle.
In an often-cited study that appeared in the May 8, 1971, issue of the British Medical Journal he divided smokers into five types based on their level of addiction. His studies provided some of the most important evidence of the phenomenon that became known as compensation, whereby reduction in cigarette nicotine levels simply caused smokers to inhale more deeply and experience a corresponding increase in tar and carbon monoxide intake.
In 1974, he scrutinized twenty-five years of data on cigarette prices and consumption and concluded that price increases were a more effective way to decrease smoking rates than were health warnings. Russell explained that he had undertaken the study because he believed that a safer cigarette would be difficult to produce, since smokers were likely to find a nicotine-free cigarette unacceptable and since carbon monoxide absorption could not be reduced unless smokers stopped inhaling. Despite this pessimism, Russell was also critical of tobacco control programs that focused on complete abstinence. He maintained that a more realistic goal was to convince cigarette smokers to switch to cigars or pipes or to stop inhaling. In addition, he stressed the need for cigarettes that reduced tar and carbon monoxide yields without reducing nicotine. As a result, he continued to examine ways to create a safer cigarette despite his doubts.
Two scientists for the British-American Tobacco Company (BATCo), Ray E. Thornton and A. Kay Comer, attended a talk given by Russell in 1975 and came away with the impression that his research was not necessarily hostile to the industry. Comer filed a seven-page summary of Russell’s presentation, concluding, “If cigarette smoking is as addictive as the evidence suggests, it is not surprising that anti-smoking campaigns are ineffective, and moves towards the safer cigarette are the only sensible way forward. This is the view which Dr. Russell seems to adopt.” Russell did indeed collaborate with BATCo on several studies over the next few years. Yet by and large, he remained a scientist who had the respect of both the industry and its opponents without being identified with either side.
This precarious status was demonstrated in a revealing internal 1979 memo penned by Thornton. Thornton noted that BATCo had provided Dr. Russell with “a considerable amount of technical assistance” over the preceding three years, principally for three of his smoking behavioural experiments, but had not provided financial support. “Since January 1977,” he added, “we have had many discussions with Dr. Russell and we believe that we have been able to influence some of his attitudes towards smoking, particularly in the area of ‘safer cigarettes,’ typically the low tar: normal nicotine approach.” Thornton went on to describe Russell as “one of the leading, if not the leading medical worker on smoking” and as a “prolific author … [who] referees many of the other papers published on smoking.” He observed that the scientist and BATCo “have not always agreed” but stated that Russell “has always been pro-smoking to the extent that he has offered to support cigarettes which he thinks are ‘safer’” and “has shifted his ground towards our point of view.”
As a result, Thornton visited Russell on October 26, 1979, to discuss funding new research. He reported with cautious optimism that Russell seemed “prepared to work rather more closely with B.A.T than in the past, and he is now interested in some financial support.” Thornton then outlined a plan for offering such funding on a “modest” basis, concluding, “In view of Dr. Russell’s undisputed eminence in the medically-orientated smoking behaviour area, I recommend that we should support him on the lines detailed above. I believe that Dr. Russell would, in future, be prepared to take more notice of our advice, particularly on cigarettes.”
But while Russell was prepared to “take more notice” of industry input, he retained his independence. In 1980, he published a piece entitled “Relation of Nicotine Yield of Cigarettes to Blood Nicotine Concentrations in Smokers” in the British Medical Journal that BATCo scientist Kay Comer characterized in 1982 as being “often quoted as supporting the compensation hypothesis.” Comer, however, continued to express guarded optimism that Russell’s research would prove beneficial to the industry.
She noted that Russell had “recently submitted for publication a paper which is based on results of a collaborative study with BAT in 1977/78.” She reported that the study led Russell to conclude that “heavy smokers who cannot easily give up the habit could benefit their health by switching to a low-tar, low-nicotine brand.” Comer observed that, “This is a marked change in attitude from the person who has so strongly advocated LT/medium nicotine cigarettes” and went on to speculate about whether to “choose to publish” a study with findings that seemed at odds with those of his earlier research.
Meanwhile Russell continued to doggedly examine the question from every angle. In 1983, he studied snuff-taking as a replacement for cigarette use. “Since it’s made from tobacco, snuff contains nicotine just like a cigarette,” he explained. “Although nicotine is addictive, it is not that which make smoking so dangerous. It is the inhalation of tar, which causes lung cancer and bronchitis, and of such gases as carbon monoxide and oxides of nitrogen, which are associated with heart disease. None of these is present in snuff. We found that taking a small amount of the liquid snuff in each nostril gave the same nicotine buzz as one cigarette in about the same time. We hope that, eventually, smokers will be able to use the drops as a substitute and then gradually wean themselves off the nicotine habit.”
In the mid-1980s, Russell’s research on nicotine and smoking habits finally began to decrease. The smoking-related research that he continued to do now focused on cessation, suggesting that he had finally convinced himself that there was indeed no safe cigarette. Ironically, it was around this time that his earlier studies began to attract widespread attention, being cited in the Surgeon General’s Report and many other documents as evidence that compensation offset the potential benefits of many purportedly safer cigarettes. In the years to come, BATCo’s interest in Russell’s research came to light and was cited in many tobacco-related lawsuits as evidence of the industry’s awareness of the risks of smoking.
Russell, however, has retained a low profile and information about him is all but impossible to come by other than what can be gleaned from Burke’s Peerage: that he married in 1962 and has two children.
Sources:
Allan M. Brandt, The Cigarette Century: The Rise, Fall and Deadly Persistence of the Product that Defined America (New York: Basic Books, 2007).
Erica Brown, “Snuff, Tradition That Still Persists,” New York Times, March 23, 1983, C15.
A. Kay Comer, Internal Memo, “Comments on a Talk Given by Dr. M.A.H. Russell,” July 17, 1975 (http://tobaccodocuments.org/mn_ex/EXHIB_bn105392360-2368.html.
A. Kay Comer, Internal Report, “Compensation – A Summary of Current Views,” January 25, 1982 (http://tobaccodocuments.org/mn_ex/EXHIB_bn105399614-9620.html).
Richard Kluger, Ashes to Ashes: America’s Hundred-Year Cigarette War and the Unabashed Triumph of Philip Morris (New York: Vintage Books, 1996).
Ray E. Thornton, Memo, “Funding for Dr. M.A.H. Russell,” October 29, 1979, bates#
103509593-103509596, http://tobaccodocuments.org/mn_ex/EXHIB_bn103509593-9596.html.
Ben Zinser, “Medicine and You,” Long Beach Independent, January 3 and April 1, 1974.
For More Biographical Information ;
Charles Mosley, editor, Burke’s Peerage and Baronetage, 106th edition, 2 volumes (Crans, Switzerland: Burke’s Peerage (Genealogical Books) Ltd, 1999), volume 1, page 116.
Key Publications :
Russell, M.A.H., “Cigarette Smoking: Natural History of a Dependence Disorder,” British Journal of Medical Psychology 44:1 (May 1971): 1-16.
Russell, M.A.H., “The Smoking Habit and Its Classification,” The Practitioner 212 (1974): 793.
Russell, M.A.H., “Tobacco Smoking and Nicotine Dependence” in Gibbins, R.J., Israel, Y., Kalant, H., Popham, R.E., Schmidt, W., Smart, R.G. (eds.) Research Advances in Alcohol and Drug Problems (New York: John Wiley and Sons, 1976), pp. 1-47.
Russell, M.A.H., Jarvis, M., Iyer, R. and Feyerabend, C., “Relation of Nicotine Yield of Cigarettes to Blood Nicotine Concentrations in Smokers,” British Medical Journal 280 (1980), 972-976.
Russell, M.A.H., Sutton, S.R., Feyerabend, C. and Saloojee, Y., “Smokers’ Response to Shortened Cigarettes: Dose Reduction Without Dilution of Tobacco Smoke,” Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics 27:2 (Feb. 1980), 210-218.
Sutton, S.R., Feyerabend, C., Cole, P.V. and Russell, M.A.H., “Adjustment of Smokers to Dilution of Tobacco Smoke by Ventilated Cigarette Holders,” Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics 24:4 (1978), 395-405.