Day 265 - 19 Jun 96 - Page 09

     
     1        Europe Against Cancer Campaign, latest version, that make
     2        much the same recommendations.  I have already summarised
     3        the generally harmonious conclusions and recommendations of
     4        international agencies, governments and authoritative
     5        bodies in my statement of 27th September 1994.
     6
     7        "I state again what I have already stated in Court, that
     8        discovery of the current state of judgment on diet and
     9        cancer, or diet and any other disease, is not a technical
    10        task.  Such judgments are contained in the conclusions and
    11        recommendations of bodies such as those cited here.  There
    12        is an analogy with the process of law itself."
    13
    14             I will read the next part:
    15        "With respect to the Court and to expert witnesses called
    16        both by the Plaintiffs and the defendants, I do not think
    17        the opinions of individual scientists, even if eminent, are
    18        material in this case except in as much as they explain the
    19        current state of the scientific judgment which, in the case
    20        of diet and its relationship with cancer, has remained much
         the same since the mid-1980s.
    22
    23        "4, Current opinion on diet and cancer.  In his new
    24        statement Dr Arnott gives his opinion about the latest
    25        state of scientific opinion on diet and cancer.  I wish to
    26        ask the Court's guidance on such updated statements of
    27        expert witnesses.  My impression so far has been that the
    28        Court wishes to know what is the state of scientific
    29        judgment on diet and cancer current when the leaflet issued
    30        by London Greenpeace was itself current."
    31
    32        I will miss the rest of that paragraph out if everyone is
    33        happy with that.
    34
    35        "I will, however, respond to Dr Arnott's statement from my
    36        knowledge of the findings of science on diet and cancer as
    37        these have been published and reviewed in the literature in
    38        the last few years.
    39
    40        "Importance of diet and cancer risk.  It is now commonly
         agreed that the links between diet and cancer are as
    42        important as those between diet and heart disease and that
    43        diet accounts for, perhaps, one third of all cancer
    44        deaths.  It follows that about one third of all cancer
    45        deaths are preventable by feasible dietary means.  In the
    46        UK this tranlates to over 50,000 preventable deaths every
    47        year, and in the EU to around 250,000 preventable deaths
    48        every year.  The global figure is about 2,500,000
    49        preventable deaths a year."
    50 
    51             Can you just explain where you get those figures from? 
    52        A.  The figure of about a third, that was first proposed by 
    53        Doll and Peter in their study, 'The Causes of Cancer',
    54        which was published in 1981 and was commissioned by the US
    55        Government and which, while formerly applying to the UK
    56        population, generally has now been taken to apply
    57        universally.  As science has developed it remains the case
    58        that when, generally speaking, authoritative bodies decide
    59        to give an estimate of cancer deaths preventable by diet,
    60        or cancer deaths caused by diet -- here we are talking