Day 036 - 13 Oct 94 - Page 54
1 Q. You said that is about as strong language as you can get,
2 I believe you said, from the Surgeon General?
3 A. Yes. I would have been amazed for him to have said
4 anything stronger even in the face of very, very strong
5 evidence of a causal relationship.
6
7 Q. Another sentence that was read out before was the World
8 Health Organisation conclusions. I will not refer the
9 court to the document again. It was on page 197 of the
10 1990 report, but I will read out the first sentence
11 again: "Dietary factors are now known", my emphasis, "to
12 influence the development", my emphasis, "of a wide range
13 of chronic diseases" and that included cancers. What is
14 your conclusion from that very carefully chosen, no doubt,
15 sentence or phrase?
16 A. It seems quite clear to me that they are saying there
17 is a very great deal of evidence that we are far beyond
18 the point of links between diet and chronic disease being
19 simply associations, speculations or suspicions; that
20 indeed, many of these relationships are well established
21 and, among them, relationships between diet and breast and
22 colon cancer.
23
24 Q. But the World Health Organisation say "known", "dietary
25 factors are now known"; is that stronger than you would
26 put it may be?
27
28 MR. JUSTICE BELL: You are really giving the evidence for him,
29 are you not?
30
31 MR. MORRIS: OK. Mr. Rampton did emphasis that particular
32 phrase and went it into detail.
33 A. To respond to the question that you put me just
34 briefly, it is not stronger than, I would say. I think
35 that in the discussion of diet and cancer as it occurs at
36 scientific conferences all the time and has occurred,
37 perhaps in this courtroom, we talk about epidemiology
38 where there are areas of ongoing disagreement. But when
39 one looks at certain other links, there are things that
40 clearly are known, that a diet that is high-in-fat and
41 high in sugar which are the most concentrated calorie wise
42 nutrients possible is known to increase the likelihood of
43 obesity, the risks of obesity. Obesity is known to
44 increase the risk of breast cancer. So, it is quite safe
45 to say that, yes, dietary factors are known to increase
46 the risks of chronic disease, among them cancer, that
47 being one of those links; there are many.
48
49 That tends to sometimes not enter into the discussion that
50 we are talking about the epidemiologic data. I guess I
51 have emphasised that quite a number of times.
52
53 Q. I think there are just a couple more questions.
54 Mr. Rampton at the very beginning of his evidence all
55 those days ago produced a packet of Gitanes.
56
57 MR. JUSTICE BELL: I do not think it was his evidence, in
58 fairness to him.
59
60 MR. MORRIS: Sorry, his cross-examination -- maybe it was his
