Report: Rjr Linked Tobacco To Cancer In ‘53

A scientist for R.J. Reynolds in 1953 acknowledged in a company memo that clinical studies “tend to confirm” the link between smoking and lung cancer, NBC Nightly News reported Thursday.

One of the earliest tobacco company documents to link smoking with cancer, it noted the “growing suspicion … even acceptance, among medical men and cancer researchers that the parallel increase in cigarette consumption and incidence of lung cancer was more than coincidence.”

The document was written 11 years before the surgeon general’s first warning about the dangers of smoking.

R.J. Reynolds officials told The Associated Press the document confirmed that the company had “long been concerned with and responsive to reports in the scientific literature and popular media on the potential relationship between smoking and certain diseases.”