Less Hazardous Cigarette Debated
- G. H. Miller, PhD
- John Schumaker, PhD
Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text.
Excerpt
To the Editor.— The article "Toward Less Hazardous Cigarettes: Current Advances" by Gori and Lynch (240:1255, 1978) in The Journal appears to have a number of serious deficiencies. An analysis of the data and the references cited in the article shows the following discrepancies:
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The basis for the computation of the "tolerable levels" of cigarettes that "would not significantly increase the risk to the smoker when compared to the nonsmoker" does not appear to be valid. In the initial article by Gori,1 "Low-Risk Cigarettes: A Prescription," published in Science in 1976, the author develops the concept of "critical value," which is the basis for the computations on the tolerable levels of cigarettes. However, his computations of the critical values are based on assumptions that are not documented. These computations are not valid representations of the data analyzed. His assumptions for critical values have been criticized by a number of
Footnotes
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Edited by John D. Archer, MD, Senior Editor.
