3 ms·
> It was common for people in the US to reject the idea of smoking as a cause of lung cancer until like the 1980s. Scientific consensus on this fact was reached
by brandonmenc 8y ago
> It was common for people in the US to reject the idea of smoking as a cause of lung cancer until like the 1980s. Scientific consensus on this fact was reached in the 60s and was suspected for a while before that. Yet, it took like 40 years for the public to agree.
You're exaggerating.
It did not take until after the year 2000 for the public to believe that smoking causes cancer.
- mywittyname 8y agoNo I'm not... https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3894634/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3894634/ > The public relations campaign -- which would extend for over 40 years -- was designed with the goal of reassuring the public, especially current smokers, that the question of whether smoking caused harm was an “open controversy” (1, 4, 14). > A poll conducted in 1966 found only 40% of Americans recognizing smoking as a major cause of cancer, while 27% said it was a minor cause and one-third said the science was not yet able to tell (2). In 2001 Gallup re-asked this same question and found 71% of Americans naming smoking as a major cause of cancer, with 11% saying it was a minor cause and 16% unsure (26).
- brandonmenc 8y agoWow. Yikes!