According to a study published today and reported by The Sun, among others:
Cancer cases caused by smoking are at an all-time high, according to Cancer Research UK.
Analysis by the charity suggests 160 people are diagnosed per day – nearly 58,000 per year.
All time high? Seriously?
To put this in perspective, smoking peaked in the 1950s when 80 per cent of men and 40 per cent of women in the UK were smokers.
Seventy years later, having been in decline for most of that time, smoking rates are currently at their lowest ever recorded levels, with fewer than 13 per cent of the population currently smoking.
Given the nature of cancer I accept there will be some lag effect, but 60-70 years? Not even CRUK has made that leap.
Instead, on GB News this morning, head of public affairs Shaun Walsh spoke of the lag effect in relation to people who smoked 10-15 years ago.
At that time the UK smoking rate was 21 per cent (2009), falling to 17 per cent five years later (2014).
How then can the cancer cases allegedly caused by smoking possibly be at an all time high compared to previous generations when far more people smoked?
Even if the lag time was 30 or 40 years, cancer cases would have reached their peak in the 1980s or 1990s.
So what's behind this absurd claim? I'm sure it's a coincidence but there’s the little matter of the generational tobacco sales ban.
Furthermore, according to the same report in The Sun:
A letter signed by 35 health experts and charities will be sent to the new Health Secretary, Wes Streeting, on Tuesday [today] calling for ministers to end smoking.
Published in the British Medical Journal, the open letter calls for Labour to adopt Rishi Sunak’s plan to stop children born after 2009 ever being allowed to buy tobacco.
Ah, yes, it all makes sense now. The tobacco control industry is desperate that the new Labour Government includes the generational ban in the King’s Speech on July 17 and this is their latest attempt at lobbying ministers, not that Keir Starmer and health secretary Wes Streeting need much persuading.
As for organisations lobbying government, potentially in breach of their charitable status, I'll leave that for another day. Watch this space.
PS. I should add that most cancers – with the notable exception of lung cancer – are multifactorial, which means there could well be factors other than smoking involved.
Even lung cancer isn't 100 per cent attributable to smoking. About 80 per cent of lung cancer sufferers have been smokers, but the reasons for the other 20 per cent have never been clear – general air pollution, perhaps, or even genetic reasons.
One report said the cancer cases in today's study include breast cancer which is curious because, as far as I’m aware, breast cancer has rarely if ever been associated with smoking. So why now?
Update: According to the CRUK press release:
This is also the first time Cancer Research UK has included breast cancer as a cancer type caused by smoking in this kind of analysis.
The scientific research for this link has been growing for years and the charity is now confident in the evidence showing that smoking causes around 2,200 cases of breast cancer every year in the UK.
Below: Yours truly with Andrew Pierce and Beverley Turner on GB News this morning
