Scientist who tied smoking, cancer dies

LONDON – Sir Richard Doll, the British scientist who first established a link between smoking and lung cancer, died last Sunday. He was 92.

The epidemiologist, whose research was credited with preventing millions of premature deaths, died at the John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford after a short illness, according to Oxford University, where Doll worked at the Imperial Cancer Research Center.

His seminal 1950 study, which he wrote with Austin Bradford Hill, showed that smoking was “a cause, and a major cause” of lung cancer.

During groundbreaking research, he and colleagues interviewed some 700 lung cancer patients to establish a common thread.

“It was not long before it became clear that cigarette smoking may be to blame,” Doll said of the research. “I gave up smoking two-thirds of the way through that study.” The findings were published in 1950 and confirmed in a paper in 1954.

Doll remained active up to his death, releasing a follow-up study in 2004 that showed at least half, and perhaps as many as two-thirds, of people who begin smoking in their youth are eventually killed by the habit.

“Richard Doll’s work has prevented millions of premature deaths in the 20th century, and will prevent tens of millions of premature deaths in the present century. He was unique in medical history,” said Professor Sir Richard Peto, his close colleague for more than 30 years.

Doll was regarded as one of the most eminent scientists of his generation. He published hundreds of papers on topics as varied as oral contraception, peptic ulcers and electrical power lines and demonstrated that aspirin could protect against heart disease. He also uncovered evidence to suggest that drinking alcohol increased the risk of breast cancer.