Surgeon General’s Reports

Dr. Jonathan Samet, former director of the IGTC, has been an editor for multiple reports of the Surgeon General, including serving as senior scientific editor of the two more recent reports: The Health Consequences of Smoking, 2004 and The Health Consequences of Involuntary Smoking, 2006. The Institute for Global Tobacco Control worked in collaboration with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Office on Smoking and Health to develop databases of key articles cited in the 2004 and 2006 Surgeon General's Reports.

2006 Surgeon General's Report: The Health Consequences of Involuntary Exposure to Tobacco Smoke
This Surgeon General’s report returns to the topic of the health effects of involuntary exposure to tobacco smoke. The last comprehensive review of this evidence by the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) was in the 1986 Surgeon General’s report published 20 years ago this year. This new report updates the evidence of the harmful effects of involuntary exposure to tobacco smoke. The accompanying dynamic database profiles key epidemiologic findings and allows the evidence on health effects of exposure to tobacco smoke to be synthesized and updated. The database enables users to explore the data and studies supporting the conclusions in the report.

Executive Summary   Full Report   Database

2004 Surgeon General's Report: The Health Consequences of Smoking

Of the Surgeon General’s reports published since 1964, only a few have comprehensively documented and updated the evidence on active smoking and disease. This report finds that smoking is even more harmful than thought and damages virtually every organ in the body. It adds nine more diseases, many of them life-threatening, to the already long list of harms caused by smoking. It finds that smoking remains the leading preventable cause of death in the U.S. and harms the health of people at every stage of life, including unborn babies, infants, children, adolescents, adults and seniors. The Institute for Global Tobacco Control and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Office on Smoking and Health have collaborated on the creation of a database, which includes abstracts of more than 1,600 key articles cited in the 2004 report.

Executive Summary   Full Report   Database