§ Lord Janner of Braunstoneasked Her Majesty's Government:
How many men and how many women have (a) been treated for and (b) died from disease caused by active smoking in each of the last five years for which figures are available; and [HL983]
How many men and how many women have (a) been treated for and (b) died from disease caused by passive smoking in each of the last five years for which figures are available. [HL984]
§ Lord Hunt of Kings HeathInformation is not routinely collected on the number of men and women who have been treated for diseases caused by active or passive smoking.
It is estimated that smoking causes 120,000 deaths in the UK each year. (Source: The UK Smoking Epidemic: Deaths in 1995, Health Education Authority). Comparable figures are not available for other years.
The Scientific Committee on Tobacco and Health (SCOTH) in its 1998 report concluded that, "exposure to environmental tobacco smoke is a cause of lung cancer and, in those with long term exposure, the increased risk is in the order of 20–30 per cent". The committee repeated the explanation of this risk set out in the Fourth Report of the Scientific Committee on Smoking and Health, ie, "a 20–30 per cent increased risk in exposed non-smokers would be a rate of 12–13 80WA per 100,000 per year. Thus we would expect an additional two to three lung cancer cases a year per 100,000 non-smokers regularly exposed to ETS. The numbers of people so exposed are not known precisely but an estimate would suggest about several hundred extra lung cancer deaths a year are caused by exposure to passive smoking.