Let me count that again

• Published in: Injury prevention Vol. 26; no. 4; p. 301
• Main Author: McClure, Roderick J
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: England BMJ Publishing Group Ltd 01.08.2020; BMJ Publishing Group LTD
• Subjects: Editorial; Education; Epidemiology; Health services; injury diagnosis; Injury prevention; interventions; Laryngeal cancer; Lung cancer; mechanism; Medical diagnosis; Medical research; Public health; Risk factors; Surveillance; United States > US; mechanism; injury diagnosis; interventions
• ISSN: 1353-8047; 1475-5785; 1475-5785
• DOI: 10.1136/injuryprev-2020-043906

Descriptive epidemiology is the means by which we can elucidate the nature and extent of a problem and describe its distribution by time, person, place, severity, activity, location and mechanism. Data can be used to generate hypotheses about the cause, identify risk factors, quantify countermeasure efficacy and determine the effectiveness of programme implementation.1 So how much data are enough? A more useful way of asking this question is ‘How much data do I need before I can confidently act?’ In 1964, Dr Terry, Surgeon General of the US Public Health Service, named cigarette smoking a cause of lung cancer and laryngeal cancer in men, a probable cause of lung cancer in women and the most important cause of chronic bronchitis.2 How many years after that were vested interests still arguing the need for more data before those claims could be substantiated.3 It would be interesting to examine in the same light many of the calls for more data on a range of contemporary issues. Washington: U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, Public Health Service, Center for Disease Control, 1964.