From 1951 to 2001, researchers at the University of Oxford [2] in Oxford, England, conducted the British Doctors? Study, a study that examined the smoking habits, disease rates, and mortality rates of physicians in Britain. Two epidemiologists, scientists who study occurrence and distribution of disease, Richard Doll and Austin Bradford Hill, initiated the study, and statistician Richard Peto j...

Mr. Chairman, ladies and gentlemen. It is an honor, indeed, to be asked to give the Linsley R. Williams Memorial Lecture, and to participate thereby in the Laity Series of the New York Academy of Medicine. The fruitful career of Dr. Williams included contributions of great importance to the modern structure of the New York Academy of Medicine, which he served as full-time director, and also to ...