The development of lung cancer in Denmark, 1950 – 1996.

It is insufficiant to make theoretical considerations from a smoker survey. It is imperative to check if the considerations match observations in the real world. In this section it will be checked if it is alcohol or smoking that is the dominant factor for occurance of lung cancer in Denmark. The data used here are from the Health Boards publications on causes of death in the period 1951 – 1996, and from Statistikbankens (The statistical bank) information on alcohol and tobacco consumption in the relevant period.

Figure 1. The development in consumption of smoked tobacco and lung cancer. There is no correlation whatsoever. The occurance of lung cancer has developed independantly of smoking. Smoking os therefore not a significant cause of lung cancer in Denmark. The sales of smoked tobacco is in millions of cigarettes, where cigars have been factored in, in the relation 1:2.

Figure 2. The development in consumption of alcohol and occurance of lung cancer. There is a very good correlation between alcohol consumption and lung cancer. Alcohol is easily seen to be the dominant factor for lung cancer in Denmark. Alcohol consumption is equivalted to thousand litres of pure alcohol.