Identifying carcinogenic agents in the workplace and environment

Abstract

In Cancer Scroti,1 Sir Percivall Pott reports a new occupational disease, “the chimney-sweepers' cancer”. In reality, Pott does much more: he concludes that in these workers the disease originates from a lodgement of soot in the scrotum—the first attribution of an occupational cancer to a specific cause. Pott begins by citing De Morbis Artificum Diatriba (1700) by Bernardino Ramazzini (1633–1714), which describes diseases of workers in 40 occupations, and is recognised as the seminal work of occupational medicine.