RCP Report, 1962

The RCP established a committee in 1959 to examine the data about smoking and health. The committee reviewed the scientific literature and considered all the various explanations that had been put forth about the rise in lung cancer cases and, in particular, about the more common occurrence of lung cancer among people who smoked. The committee also reviewed data pertaining to other conditions thought related to smoking. The Royal College issued its report on March 7, 1962, at a press conference headed by Sir Robert Platt, president of the college. The major conclusions were these:

The benefits of smoking are almost entirely psychological and social. It may help some people to avoid obesity. There is no reason to suppose that smoking prevents neurosis.

Cigarette smoking is a cause of lung cancer and bronchitis, and probably contributes to the development of coronary heart disease and various other less common diseases. It delays healing of gastric and duodenal ulcers.

The risks of smoking to the individual are calculated from death rates in relation to smoking habits among British doctors. The chance of dying in the next ten years for a man aged 35 who is a heavy cigarette smoker is 1 in 23, whereas the risk for a non-smoker is only 1 in 90. Only 15% (one in six) of men this age who are non-smokers but 33% (one in three) of heavy smokers will die before the age of 65. Not all this difference in expectation of life is attributable to smoking.

The number of deaths caused by diseases associated with smoking is large. (3, p. S7)

Thirty thousand copies of the report had been sold in the United States by May. Reader's Digest and Scientific American , among other publications, gave prominence to articles based on it (14, 15).

The tobacco industry's official statement in response to the RCP report avoided direct disagreement with it but called it "incomplete." The British Medical Journal reported,

On publication of the Royal College of Physicians' report the Tobacco Manufacturers' Standing Committee stated: 'The R.C.P. Committee was set up to consider the effects on health of both smoking and air pollution. By deferring to a separate report its consideration of air pollution the R.C.P. Committee has recognized the importance and complexity of this factor, but in so doing the Committee has, in T.M.S.C.'s view, produced an incomplete assessment of the problems involved.' The Tobacco Manufacturers' Standing Committee regards the three following approaches in research as 'both practical and essential': (a) 'A study of environment and personal characteristics, as well as past medical histories,' may throw important new light on the incidence of lung cancer and chronic bronchitis. (b) 'Much more research is undoubtedly needed into the constituents and effects of air pollution.' (c) 'Further investigation is needed into the chemistry and biological effects of tobacco smoke.' (16, p. 810)

The Tobacco Manufacturers' Standing Committee (TMSC), formed in 1956 by the British tobacco companies, was modeled on the American TIRC. TMSC, like TIRC, funded independent researchers to study issues related to smoking and health. Unlike TIRC, however, TMSC also conducted in-house research at a jointly sponsored industry laboratory in Harrogate, England, The Harrogate laboratory was opened in 1962. It conducted several large-scale studies on the effects of tobacco smoke

inhalation and skin painting in mice (to study cancer) and also did some work on nicotine (see chapters 3 and 4). Shortly after the Harrogate lab was opened, TMSC was renamed the Tobacco Research Council (TRC). The name was later changed again to the Tobacco Advisory Committee (TAC) {1014.01, pp. 11–12}.