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Publicity has failed. In any case it has been quite inadequate
when compared with the skilful and sustained
propaganda for smoking conducted by the tobacco industry
much of it directed at the adolescent boy and girl to whom
smoking is presented as something fine and glamorous and
a sign of maturity. It would be wrong, in spite of public
apathy, to drop this subject and accept the consequences. It
is hoped that the wise person will, progressively, cut down
his cigarettes or, better still, give them up altogether, or
change over to a pipe which is considered to be less
dangerous.
During 1960 a concentrated mass x-ray survey was
carried out in Bexley, Erith and Crayford (total population
166,800) in conjunction with the South-East Metropolitan
Regional Hospital Board. The results of this survey are given
in the body of the report. It will be seen that 35,250 people
were x-rayed (Bexley 16,640) but it should be stated that
an additional seven thousand were x-rayed in factories just
prior to the campaign in order to free the units from some
of their routine work. Further, the fact that a high proportion
of local residents work in London ensures that many
are x-rayed by units operating in different parts of the metropolis.
A diagnosis of pulmonary tuberculosis was made in 169
cases (Bexley 78) of which 57 (Bexley 28) required close
supervision or treatment—an incidence of 1.6 per thousand
x-rayed. The total number x-rayed, however, includes 16,040
persons who had not previously been x-rayed and these
show an incidence for tuberculosis of 2.7 per thousand
x-rayed. One can agree, therefore, with the statement made
in the Survey report by Dr. J. M. Morgan, Director of the
South-East London Mass X-Ray Service that "an important
step has been made in reducing the number of unrecognised
cases in the area surveyed." He continues, "It seems unlikely,
however, that more than 60 per cent of adult residents in
the areas have been examined in the last five years, including
those who have been x-rayed elsewhere and, in an effort to
reach the remaining 40 per cent. a mass radiography unit is
visiting Bexleyheath, weekly, and it is hoped that it will
prove possible to persuade a substantial number of this unexamined
group to attend." Persons attending this weekly
session are, in the main, referred by their private doctors
and these attendances are, therefore, more selective than is
the case in ordinary mass radiography sessions.
One finding of the 1960 X-Ray Survey in regard to the
number of cases of cancer of the lung per thousand
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