[Smoking and mortality in lung cancer]

From 1978 to 1980, a retrospective epidemiologic survey on mortality of lung cancer was undertaken in Taiyuan, an industrial city of Shanxi Province. The average crude mortality was 14.35/100,000, the third place in death of the malignancies. In the male the mortality was 20.46 ranking the second. In the female, it was 7.26, the fourth. It was increased markedly in the man over 35 years old and in the woman over 40. The death rate was higher in the urban districts than in the suburbs of the city. This difference was statistically significant (P less than 0.05). In the urban districts, suburbs of this city and its countryside, both the incidence and mortality showed significant differences in smoking and non-smoking groups (P less than 0.01). This result indicates that smoking is related to lung cancer. The mortality of malignant tumors was 176.69/100,000 in the smoking group, whereas in the non-smoking group, it remained at the level of 46.65/100,000. It should be further studied that how smoking exerts influence on the other malignancies. The relative risks (RR) of lung cancer to smoking were 3.07 in the male and 2.60 in the female with a total RR of 3.52. The data mentioned above suggest that cigarette smoking plays an important role in the cause of lung cancer. Hence, to advocate abstinence of smoking is of vital importance, especially in the industrial districts.