[Smoking and lung cancer].

Since fifty years it is clear now that smoking of tobacco products is responsible for the lung cancer epidemic that is currently in progress worldwide. Although in the Western world a small decrease of lung cancer in males is found, the number of female patients is steadily increasing. Changes in tobacco production have resulted in exposition of smokers to other carcinogens. This is probably the cause of the change in the histological pattern with an increase of adenocarcinoma and stabilisation of squamous cell lung cancer. Despite the bad prognosis there is some hope that with improvement of early detection methods more patients can be cured. However, for a real change it is necessary to discourage smoking by all means.