Smoke-free generation laws with a built-in evaluation across countries
Banning tobacco sales to anyone born after a set year, as the UK is doing, could end smoking within a generation. Adopting countries should coordinate evaluation so the evidence is undeniable.
The UK Tobacco and Vapes Bill implements a rising age of sale; New Zealand repealed its version in 2024. Propose an international consortium pre-registering outcome measures (smoking initiation by birth cohort, illicit market share, retail compliance) and using synthetic-control designs.
- Prevention we already have is not deployed · Around four in ten cancers are preventable with tools we already own: vaccines, tobacco control, weight, alcohol, sun and infection control.
Smoking is the single largest preventable cause of cancer death, and quitting at any age helps, with the greatest gain from quitting young. Cessation support belongs in every cancer service, including lung screening programmes.
Doll and Hill's 1950 study is where the evidence that smoking causes cancer begins. Everything from cigarette warnings and tax to smoke-free laws and lung screening eligibility descends from this study and the cohort that followed it.
Pages like this
not linked directly; found by shared links- IdeaEvery lung screening visit includes stop-smoking medicine, opt-out
Shares Fifty years of the British Doctors Study: smokers lose ten years of life, quitting gives most of it back, Prevention we already have is not deployed, Non-small-cell lung cancer.
- IdeaEvaluate clean-air policies using lung cancer in never-smokers
Shares Doll and Hill 1950: the case-control study that tied smoking to lung cancer, Prevention we already have is not deployed, Non-small-cell lung cancer.
- IdeaMandatory radon testing when homes are sold, with subsidised mitigation
Shares Prevention we already have is not deployed, Non-small-cell lung cancer.
- IdeaMake cigarettes non-addictive by capping their nicotine
Shares Prevention we already have is not deployed, Non-small-cell lung cancer.
- IdeaPut cytisine, a cheap plant-based quit-smoking pill, on every essential medicines list
Shares Prevention we already have is not deployed, Non-small-cell lung cancer.
- IdeaCancer warnings on alcohol labels, evaluated as a natural experiment
Shares Evaluate alcohol minimum unit pricing against cancer incidence, Prevention we already have is not deployed.
- TermAlcohol-attributable cancer
Shares Evaluate alcohol minimum unit pricing against cancer incidence, Prevention we already have is not deployed.
- TechnologyAlcohol reduction, pricing and cancer warning labels
Shares Evaluate alcohol minimum unit pricing against cancer incidence, Prevention we already have is not deployed.