Elsevier

The Lancet

Volume 296, Issue 7685, 12 December 1970, Pages 1237-1240
The Lancet

Occasional Survey
RELATIONSHIP AS A CLUE TO CAUSATION

https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(70)92195-1Get rights and content

Abstract

There is reason to suspect a common or related cause for diseases which are both associated with one another in their geographical distribution and tend to occur together in the same patients. Recognition of such relationships could provide potentially fruitful leads as to causation. Examples which include some of the commonest killing diseases of the Western world are supported by epidemiological and other evidence.

References (37)

  • D.P. Burkitt

    Lancet

    (1969)
  • J.A. Rider et al.

    Am. J. med.

    (1954)
  • H.L. Bockus et al.

    Gastroenterology

    (1961)
  • D.F. Hollingsworth et al.

    Am. J. clin. Med.

    (1967)
  • A.M. Cohen et al.

    Br. med. J.

    (1961)
  • D.P. Burkitt

    Br. J. Surg.

    (1958)
  • D.P. Burkitt

    Int. J. Path.

    (1970)
  • M.C. Williams

    Treatment of Burkitt's Lymphoma

    (1967)
  • G.N. Stemmermann

    Archs Envir. Hlth

    (1970)
  • J.A. Rider et al.

    J. Am. med. Ass.

    (1959)
  • G.N. Stemmermann

    Cancer

    (1966)
  • B.C. Morson et al.

    Predisposing Causes of Intestinal Cancer

    (1970)
  • J.R. McVay

    Summary of scientific exhibit

    (1970)
  • E.L. Wynder et al.

    Cancer

    (1967)
  • J.C. Davidson et al.

    Med. Proc.

    (1969)
  • N. Marine et al.

    Diabetes

    (1969)
  • Campbell, G. D. Personal...
  • H.C. Seftel et al.

    S. Afr. med. J.

    (1970)
  • Cited by (90)

    • Evolution of bacteria in the human gut in response to changing environments: An invisible player in the game of health

      2021, Computational and Structural Biotechnology Journal
      Citation Excerpt :

      In general, the common use of food processing in Western culture creates a more desirable food to the uneducated human palate, but removes much of the fiber. When observing the fiber intake of Western people and non-Western groups in rural Africa during the late 1960s/early 1970s, Denis Burkitt found that Westerners had modified their diet in such a way as to dramatically reduce fiber consumption [24,25]. In 2019, it was observed that people in Western societies consume about 66% less fiber compared to those in rural South Africa and Uganda [26].

    • The association between dietary fibre deficiency and high-income lifestyle-associated diseases: Burkitt's hypothesis revisited

      2019, The Lancet Gastroenterology and Hepatology
      Citation Excerpt :

      The Lancet took a leading role in the development and dissemination of the fibre hypothesis, which was subsequently named Burkitt's hypothesis after its major protagonist, Denis Burkitt.1,2

    • Mapping the methodologies of Burkitt lymphoma

      2014, Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part C :Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences
      Citation Excerpt :

      Burkitt, for example, continued to research both the geographical aspects of particular diseases (for instance, work on dietary fibre and bowel disease in Burkitt, Walker, & Painter, 1972), and the conceptual features of disease geography. This included work on the role of geographical studies in malignant diseases in general (Burkitt, 1965); the role of comparative geographical studies of disease (Burkitt, 1969, 1970) in understanding disease causation; the special role played by geographical methods in investigating disease peculiar to particular tribal groups (Burkitt, 1969); and the role played by mapping in understanding disease outbreaks that cross national borders (Burkitt, 1968). A second evidential feature of this case developed through the reuse of existing research infrastructure.

    View all citing articles on Scopus
    View full text