47 - The Criteria

Can we ever know what causes a chronic disease? In this episode, I’m joined again by Dr. Shoshana Herzig to finish a three-part miniseries on Bradford Hill and Doll’s attempts to prove that smoking caused lung cancer. We’ll talk about the first prospective cohort trial in history, 1960s “Fake News” from tobacco companies, public spats with the most famous statistician of the 20th century, and the development of the Bradford Hill Criteria, a guideline, however imperfect, that gives doctors a blueprint to finally figure out what causes diseases. Sources: Crofton J, The MRC randomized trial of streptomycin and its legacy: a view from the clinical front line. J R Soc Med. 2006 Oct; 99(10): 531–534. Daniels M and Bradford Hill A, Chemotherapy of Pulmonary Tuberculosis in Young Adults, Br Med J. 1952 May 31; 1(4769): 1162–1168. Dangers of Cigarette-smoking. Brit Med J 1, 1518 (1957). Doll, R. & Hill, B. A. Lung Cancer and Other Causes of Death in Relation to Smoking. Brit Med J 2, 1071 (1956). Doll, R. & Hill, B. A. Smoking and Carcinoma of the Lung. Brit Med J 2, 739 (1950). Hill, A. The Environment and Disease: Association or Causation? J Roy Soc Med 58, 295–300 (1965). HOFFMAN, F. L. CANCER AND SMOKING HABITS. Ann Surg 93, 50–67 (1931). Keating C, Smoking Kills: The Revolutionary Life of Richard Doll. 2009. Morabia, A. Quality, originality, and significance of the 1939 “Tobacco consumption and lung carcinoma” article by Mueller, including translation of a section of the paper. Prev Med 55, 171–177 (2012). Ochsner, A. & bakey. Primary pulmonary malignancy: treatment by total pneumonectomy; analysis of 79 collected cases and presentation of 7 personal cases. Ochsner J 1, 109–25 (1999). Ochsner, A. My first recognition of the relationship of smoking and lung cancer. Prev Med 2, 611–614 (1973). Parascandola, M. Two approaches to etiology: the debate over smoking and lung cancer in the 1950s. Endeavour 28, 81–86 (2004). Phillips, C. V. & Goodman, K. J. The missed lessons of Sir Austin Bradford Hill. Epidemiologic Perspectives Innovations 1, 1–5 (2004). Proctor, R. Angel H Roffo: the forgotten father of experimental tobacco carcinogenesis. B World Health Organ 84, 494–495 (2006). Wynder, E. RE: “WHEN GENIUS ERRS: R. A. FISHER AND THE LUNG CANCER CONTROVERSY”. Am J Epidemiol 134, 1467–9 (1991).