Richard Doll was an epidemiologist and public figure in the twentieth and early twenty-first centuries. Working primarily at the University of Oxford, in Oxford, England, Doll established a definitive correlation between cigarette smoking and lung cancer. Furthermore, Doll’s work helped legitimize epidemiology as a scientific discipline. Doll’s research also helped establish modern guidelines for oncological studies, as well as for contemporary and future research on the effect of smoking on pregnancy and fetal development. In addition to studying the health effects of smoking, Doll also studied cervical cancer and contraceptives.
From 1951 to 2001, researchers at the University of Oxford 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 joined the team in 1971. The objective of the study was to assess the risks associated with tobacco use, and its relationship to lung cancer. The researchers tracked 34,439 male doctors practicing in Britain, and recorded smoking habits, development of diseases including lung cancer, other cancers, respiratory diseases, cardiovascular diseases, and mortality rates. The researchers published updated results every ten years. In 1980, Doll and other researchers concluded a related study on the smoking habits and disease rates of female doctors practicing in Britain. The results of both studies provided evidence that individuals who smoked tobacco were more likely to develop chronic respiratory illnesses, including lung cancer, and cardiovascular diseases.
Objective: To determine the consumption frequency of foods with added sugar among smoking groups: nonsmokers, cigarette smokers, vapers, and dual users in young adults ages 18-24.
Methods: An observational cross-sectional study was conducted using an online Qualtrics survey that included questions on demographics, smoking habits, and added sugar content and was distributed across multiple platforms for 3 months. There were 47 qualifying participants that completed the survey.
Results: There were not many cigarette user or dual user respondents, so the groups studied were modified to nonsmokers and vapers+dual users (VDU) and nonsmokers vs. nicotine users that consisted of cigarette smokers, e-cigarette users, and dual users. There were 30 (63.8%) nonsmokers, 16 (34.1%) VDU, and 17 or 36.2% of all nicotine users recorded. The added sugar consumption frequency by the three groups was similar with scores of 1.37, 1.50, and 1.54 for nonsmokers, vapers+dual users, and nicotine users, respectively.
Conclusion: There was a high number of reported vapers in this study, and nonsmokers had the lowest added sugar consumption frequency closely followed by the VDU and all nicotine users group. All groups studied had relatively low added sugar scores. More research is needed to successfully compare the added sugar content of the four intended groups.
Policy Implications: Anti-vaping policies should be targeted to this group.