Passive smoking: Tobacco industry publishes disinformation

doi:10.1136/bmj.327.7413.502-c

BMJ 2003;327:502-503 (30 August), doi:10.1136/bmj.327.7413.502-c

Letter

Passive smoking

Tobacco industry publishes disinformation

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

Editor—The American Cancer Society does not agree withthe conclusions of Enstrom and Kabat in their analysis of environmentaltobacco smoke in the cancer prevention study I (CPS-I).¹ Their study is fatally flawed because of misclassification of exposure.The cancer prevention study was started by the society in 1959to measure the effects of active smoking, not to collect validestimates of exposure to environmental tobacco smoke.² No information was obtained on sources of exposure to environmentaltobacco smoke other than the smoking status of the spouse.Tobacco smoke was so pervasive in the United States in the1950s and 1960s that virtually everyone was exposed, at home,at work, or in other settings. Enstrom and Kabat essentiallycompare non-smokers, married to a smoking spouse, with non-smokerswith other sources of exposure to environmental tobacco smoke.Misclassification of exposure is compounded because no informationwas collected on the smoking status . . . [Full text of this article]