Lung cancer ‘could one day be a rare disease’

The introduction of the smoking ban could lead to a large reduction in lung cancer rates – perhaps making it a rare disease one day, according to the chief medical officer of Scotland.

Dr Harry Burns said that part of the key to forcing lung cancer rates down was continuing to target smokers over the dangers of their addiction.

The expert fold BBC One’s Lunchtime News: “If we can continue to bring home to people a knowledge of the damage that tobacco is doing them, it is not inconceivable that for the next 20 or 30 years, we see continuing falls of lung cancer.”

He added that it was possible that lung cancer incidence could return to how it was at the start of the twentieth century, when it was a “relatively rare” disease.

Recently, there has been speculation that anti-smoking warnings would be added to DVDs that feature smoking.

Films that feature underage smoking already carry such a warning in the US.