Medical Letter on the CDC and FDA

In the following viewpoint editors from the Medical Letter on the CDC and FDA maintain that tobacco smoke is more harmful to human health than previously thought. They argue that it causes cancer in more parts of the body than once believed, and that half of the world’s 1.2 billion smokers will die prematurely from cancer, heart disease, emphysema, and other smoking-related diseases. The Medical Letter on the CDC and FDA is a newsletter covering the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) involvement with threats to public health and the Federal Drug Administration’s (FDA) research on drugs and disease.

As you read, consider the following questions:

1. According to the editors, why do scientists now have a clearer picture of the dangers of tobacco?
2. What...