Tobacco Quotes (3)
A Los Angeles surgeon who smokes (but doesn't inhale), contends that 'For the majority of people, the use of tobacco has a beneficial effect, far better for you than taking tranquilizers.'
Quoted in Newsweek (18 Nov 1969), 62, Pt. 2, 66. A misguided comment, often seen as the shortened quote 'For the majority ... beneficial effect' in a list of regrettable remarks, without the fuller context of the quote given here. MacDonald was quoted in the article to be an example that physicians were not unanimous in their attitudes against smoking. The quote is a opinion expressed to the reporter; it was not the result of scholarly research.
If excessive smoking actually plays a role in the production of lung cancer, it seems to be a minor one, if judged by the evidence on hand.
A cautious statement indicating that evidence was, in 1954, beginning to point to the connection between lung cancer and smoking.
A cautious statement indicating that evidence was, in 1954, beginning to point to the connection between lung cancer and smoking.
Quoted in 'Tobacco Industry Denies Cancer Tie'. New York Times (14 Apr 1954), 51. In Oliver E. Byrd, Health Yearbook (1954), 142. The newspaper article was a report 'that the Tobacco Industry Research Committee had made public a list of "quotations and statements authorized by 36 distinguished cancer authorities" denying that there was any proof establishing a link between smothing and lung cancer. The committee is the spokesman for the leading tobacco manufacturers and associations of tobacco growers.' Webmaster comments: So, the central news was the publication of a booklet (which was essentially statements carefully picked for the purpose of propaganda for the tobacco industry). The quoted comment of Dr. Heuper, of the National Cancer Institute, is often seen in a list of regrettable remarks&mash;where it is always stated lacking the final qualifying phrase, 'if judged by the evidence on hand.' Thus his statement was not at all an outright denial that smoking and lung cancer were related, but was—in fact— a balanced viewpoint indicating that the evidence was not yet in place. In fact, at the time, there was much debate on what reliable conclusions could be drawn on the basis of existing conflicting evidence from various researchers. Dr. Heuper's career was spent actively protecting health by carefully investigating cancer risks from various domestic and industrial chemicals. The list of regrettable remarks presently widely circulating on the web, and frequently seen in publications, unfairly distorts the intent of Heuper's quotation by omitting the final phrase. What is regrettable is that a huge number of authors are republishing the distorted remark, without consulting a primary print source and examining its context. Again, at the time, even the position of the American Cancer Society was cautiously stated, and limited to their position to: 'The evidence to date justifies suspicion that cigarette smoking does, to a degree as yet undertermined, increase the likelihood of developing cancer of the lung....' (See the ACS quote for 17 Mar 1954).
The puritanical potentialities of science have never been forecast. If it evolves a body of organized rites, and is established as a religion, hierarchically organized, things more than anything else will be done in the name of 'decency.' The coarse fumes of tobacco and liquors, the consequent tainting of the breath and staining of white fingers and teeth, which is so offensive to many women, will be the first things attended to.
Wyndham Lewis: an Anthology of his Prose (1969), 170.
See also: | Breath (7) | Establish (4) | Evolution (237) | Finger (3) | First (4) | Hierarchy (2) | Organization (12) | Potential (4) | Puritan (2) | Religion (69) | Stain (3) | Teeth (5) | Woman (18)
