Scientist who first linked smoking with cancer dies

PROFESSOR Sir Richard Doll, the scientist whose research first established a link between smoking and lung cancer, died yesterday at the age of 92.

Oxford University said the epidemiologist died at the John Radcliffe Hospital, Oxford, after a short illness.

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

Following their study, Doll and Hill began research which asked doctors about their smoking habits and tracked them over the years to see what they eventually died from.

Early results confirmed that smokers were much more likely to die of lung cancer than non-smokers, and the 10-year results showed that smoking killed far more people from other diseases than from lung cancer.

Dr John Hood, vice-chancellor of the University of Oxford, said the professor's work had saved millions of lives.

He said: "His epidemiological work on the link between smoking and cancer, cardiovascular disease and other disorders, has led to the dramatic fall in smoking rates in Britain over the past 50 years.

"But Sir Richard will also be remembered as an inspiration and mentor to generations of scientists, a community in which he loved to spend his time long into what for most of us would have been retirement. Our thoughts, at this sad time, are with his family and many friends."