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Morning News

Sir Peto: Quitting Smoking Late in Life Can Greatly Reduce Risk of Lung Cancer

Aired August 3, 2000 - 11:43 a.m. ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: We are going to keep it now thinking about, talking about our lungs and smokers who kick the habit even late in life, turns out they can greatly reduce their risk of lung cancer. That is among the findings of a new British study. The man who led that study is Sir Richard Peto, a professor at Oxford University. He is joining us by phone now to talk more about the study.

Doctor, thanks for joining us.

SIR RICHARD PETO, PROFESSOR, OXFORD UNIVERSITY: Thank you.

KAGAN: Tell us, it is never too late to quick smoking is that the bottom line?

PETO: Yes, I think that is the bottom line. If smokers keep on smoking, then there's about a 50 percent chance that eventually it will kill them. So, in the States for example, you've got about 50 million people who smoke. If they keep on, and don't give up, about half of them, that is about 25 million of them, will eventually get killed by the habit.

But if they stop smoking even in middle age, they would avoid most of that risk of death, and if people stop before middle age you avoid nearly all the risk of death. I think the evidence is very clear.

In Britain, we've got huge numbers of people have stopped smoking now, and so we've got the best decrease in tobacco deaths in the world, lung cancer deaths are really dropping in Britain so many people have stopped smoking.

KAGAN: Sir Peto, as part of the study, you also went ahead and calculated that if the people who smoke now, the same number of people, continue to smoke what that will mean in terms of smoking deaths in the future. Tell us the numbers you came up with that.

PETO: Well, if you take the United States, then we've got good evidence, that if people smoke like Americans then they finish up with about a 50 percent chance of get killed by it. And that is over 50 million smokers, you get 25 million deaths. In Britain, we got about 12 million smokers, we have about 6 million deaths, if they keep on smoking, In Britain, two-thirds of the smokers say they wish they could actually get off it. If a lot of them succeed, then we can avoid a few million of those deaths. You take the world as a whole, the numbers are so horrendous, you can hardly state them they are so big.

KAGAN: It is staggering, the number of deaths, but you are not just talking deaths, there is health care costs involved with as well.

PETO: Actually, you know, I don't care. I do care about the deaths, and I don't care about the health care costs.

KAGAN: Why not?

PETO: Because it is not real. Look, if somebody were to be killed on a road in front of you, you rush over and there is this person dying in your arms. If your first thought is, I wonder what this is going to do to our national health care costs, then there's something wrong with you. These are real deaths. They are just sort of people dying in middle age when they don't have to. And that -- I sort of feel as though it trivializes it to talk about costs. Of course, it costs -- I would like smokers to choose not to smoke because then they would be less likely to die in middle age, a 50 percent risk of death, that's really too much.

KAGAN: Just get off of them.

PETO: Choose themselves. They can choose. I'm not telling them to get off, I am just saying to know the numbers and then choose.

KAGAN: Then choose with the information, information is power, especially when it comes to a problem like smoking. That is Sir Richard Peto with that new study out on smoking. Thanks for joining us from Britain.

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