Editorials

Doctors who smoke

An apocryphal tale in public health, said to have originated from a candid tobacco industry executive, is that each doctor who smokes is worth hundreds of thousands of dollars to the industry. This is certainly an understatement when it comes to the small group of well rewarded doctors and scientists who routinely do the industry's bidding for them in government inquiries and in the media.¹ But what of general practitioners who smoke? There are two considerations here.

The first consideration concerns doctors' roles and, many would add, responsibilities as exemplars. A recent Australian study of smokers from low socioeconomic groups found that half of them agreed with the statement that "a lot of doctors smoke."² In fact, only 9% of male and 4% of female doctors in Australia admit to smoking cigarettes--the lowest occupational rate yet reported.³ Such beliefs . . . [Full text of this article]

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• Sudbury, P. (1995). Doctors who smoke. BMJ 311: 945-945 [Full text]  
• Hedley, A J (1995). Little progress has been made over 20 years. BMJ 311: 945a-945 [Full text]  
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