[Smoking habits and epidemiology of lung cancer in Austria. III. Changes in lung cancer mortality in men].

It has been possible to show that the international trend of a reduced mortality rate in lung cancer of men can also be demonstrated in the Austrian population. By means of cohort-analysis this trend has been attributed mainly to a reduced mortality in younger male population. The improvement in the quality of cigarettes, namely the reduction in the amount of carcinogens and its relation to the reduction of lung cancer death rates will be discussed. At the present time, it is impossible to decide whether or not this reduced mortality rate will remain constant in the future or whether these results may be interpreted as expressing an increased period of latency in pulmonary carcinoma.