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Gary Frederick Whitlock
Richard Peto
Obituary
Gary Frederick Whitlock Clinical epidemiologist who studied the patterns of premature death. He was born in Wanganui, New Zealand, on March 9, 1964, and died from cancer in Oxford, UK, on Oct 18, aged 49 years. Published Online January 31, 2014 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/ S0140-6736(14)60036-2 For the study on alcohol and mortality in Russia see Articles page 1465 For Gary Whitlock’s website Mortality Trends see http:// www.mortality-trends.org/ For the study by the Prospective Studies Collaboration see Lancet 2009; 373: 1083–96
1458
Epidemiologist Gary Whitlock’s most accessible memorial is an idiosyncratic website entitled Mortality Trends that he set up in 2008, originally as a pastime. Its principal content is a vast collection of mortality graphs, more than 18 000 of them, covering 40 countries. Along with helpful hints on using the data are scores of quotations, scattered throughout the site, in which Aristotle rubs shoulders with Michael Frayn, and Charles Darwin with H L Mencken. Their content ranges from the statistically germane (“Although this may seem a paradox, all exact science is dominated by the idea of approximation”, Bertrand Russell) to the whimsical. Sarah Lewington of the University of Oxford’s Clinical Trial Service Unit (CTSU), where Whitlock worked, confirms that although he started the website as a pastime he hoped that others might find the graphs useful. “I think it was also to help his own understanding of what was going on with mortality and how trends had changed over time and what might be causing them to do so.” Whitlock’s delight in statistics transcended medicine. He devoted part of his website to sports statistics, says CTSU colleague Jonathan Emberson. “He had some algorithm that would figure which were the better performances over the decades—New Zealand versus Australia in rugby over the last 100 years, for example.” Whitlock trained in medicine in his home country, New Zealand, at the University of Auckland. He graduated in 1988 and for a time thereafter his path was uncertain. He moved to Japan, and spent 3 years teaching and doing editorial and translation work. He returned home in 1993, starting a medical career in psychiatry. But this was not for
him, and on switching to epidemiology he found a discipline to engage him. He became a research fellow at the University of Auckland’s Clinical Trials Research Unit, an organisation with links to Oxford’s CTSU, then joined the CTSU in 2001. His principal interest was in the changing patterns of premature death, and the part played by various types of adiposity in certain specific causes of death. Lewington worked closely with him on the Prospective Studies Collaboration, involving 900 000 people, mostly in Europe and North America. Analyses of some 66 000 deaths showed that moderate obesity reduces life expectancy by about 3 years, and severe obesity by as much as 10 years. “It took a long time to get the analyses and interpretation right”, Lewington recalls. “Gary came here on a 2-year fellowship, and the article reporting the study wasn’t published until 2009 [in The Lancet]. He was an absolute stickler.” The task of removing confounding effects so as to reveal just the influence of adiposity on mortality proved tougher than anticipated. “When you read the paper it all seems obvious”, Lewington adds. “And it was Gary’s dogged determination to get the presentation correct that allowed the figures to hit you, and tell the story.” The final paper he co-authored, on alcohol and death in Russia, is now published in The Lancet. Sir Richard Peto, Professor of Medical Statistics and Epidemiology at the University of Oxford and one of Whitlock’s CTSU colleagues, describes him as quiet, thoughtful, and independent. “Gary always wanted to get details right, and through getting details right understand the wider picture. In the last few years he’d got to the point of having a wider picture that he was increasingly ready to share with people. But then he got ill, and wasn’t able to do so, and wasn’t able to help us take forward the emerging epidemiological findings about adiposity in South India, Mexico, and China. He would have been a very good influence on students over the next 20 years. Even in his last 18 months, knowing he had incurable cancer, he got a lot of pleasure from life (see the photo) and from ideas, and he still continued to feel that, compared with most people born last century, on balance his life had been really lucky.” “Gary was serious, but with a dry and very droll sense of humour”, says Lewington. “He loved it in Oxford and he loved being in the CTSU.” Emberson agrees that Whitlock had found a home. “The CTSU was the perfect place for him to work”, he says. “He fitted in here.” Peto recalls Whitlock’s pleasure in the quirky. “Whenever I found some striking or odd observation in epidemiology I’d show it to Gary”, Peto recalls. “He’d really appreciate why it was interesting.” Whitlock’s determination to get things right persisted to the end, and included the words that would appear on his death certificate: “parotid adenocarcinoma ex pleomorphic adenoma”. This, he insisted, was what the death certificate should show. Nothing less precise would be acceptable.
Geoff Watts www.thelancet.com Vol 383 April 26, 2014
Obituary
Gary Frederick Whitlock Clinical epidemiologist who studied the patterns of premature death. He was born in Wanganui, New Zealand, on March 9, 1964, and died from cancer in Oxford, UK, on Oct 18, aged 49 years. Published Online January 31, 2014 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/ S0140-6736(14)60036-2 For the study on alcohol and mortality in Russia see Articles page 1465 For Gary Whitlock’s website Mortality Trends see http:// www.mortality-trends.org/ For the study by the Prospective Studies Collaboration see Lancet 2009; 373: 1083–96
1458
Epidemiologist Gary Whitlock’s most accessible memorial is an idiosyncratic website entitled Mortality Trends that he set up in 2008, originally as a pastime. Its principal content is a vast collection of mortality graphs, more than 18 000 of them, covering 40 countries. Along with helpful hints on using the data are scores of quotations, scattered throughout the site, in which Aristotle rubs shoulders with Michael Frayn, and Charles Darwin with H L Mencken. Their content ranges from the statistically germane (“Although this may seem a paradox, all exact science is dominated by the idea of approximation”, Bertrand Russell) to the whimsical. Sarah Lewington of the University of Oxford’s Clinical Trial Service Unit (CTSU), where Whitlock worked, confirms that although he started the website as a pastime he hoped that others might find the graphs useful. “I think it was also to help his own understanding of what was going on with mortality and how trends had changed over time and what might be causing them to do so.” Whitlock’s delight in statistics transcended medicine. He devoted part of his website to sports statistics, says CTSU colleague Jonathan Emberson. “He had some algorithm that would figure which were the better performances over the decades—New Zealand versus Australia in rugby over the last 100 years, for example.” Whitlock trained in medicine in his home country, New Zealand, at the University of Auckland. He graduated in 1988 and for a time thereafter his path was uncertain. He moved to Japan, and spent 3 years teaching and doing editorial and translation work. He returned home in 1993, starting a medical career in psychiatry. But this was not for
him, and on switching to epidemiology he found a discipline to engage him. He became a research fellow at the University of Auckland’s Clinical Trials Research Unit, an organisation with links to Oxford’s CTSU, then joined the CTSU in 2001. His principal interest was in the changing patterns of premature death, and the part played by various types of adiposity in certain specific causes of death. Lewington worked closely with him on the Prospective Studies Collaboration, involving 900 000 people, mostly in Europe and North America. Analyses of some 66 000 deaths showed that moderate obesity reduces life expectancy by about 3 years, and severe obesity by as much as 10 years. “It took a long time to get the analyses and interpretation right”, Lewington recalls. “Gary came here on a 2-year fellowship, and the article reporting the study wasn’t published until 2009 [in The Lancet]. He was an absolute stickler.” The task of removing confounding effects so as to reveal just the influence of adiposity on mortality proved tougher than anticipated. “When you read the paper it all seems obvious”, Lewington adds. “And it was Gary’s dogged determination to get the presentation correct that allowed the figures to hit you, and tell the story.” The final paper he co-authored, on alcohol and death in Russia, is now published in The Lancet. Sir Richard Peto, Professor of Medical Statistics and Epidemiology at the University of Oxford and one of Whitlock’s CTSU colleagues, describes him as quiet, thoughtful, and independent. “Gary always wanted to get details right, and through getting details right understand the wider picture. In the last few years he’d got to the point of having a wider picture that he was increasingly ready to share with people. But then he got ill, and wasn’t able to do so, and wasn’t able to help us take forward the emerging epidemiological findings about adiposity in South India, Mexico, and China. He would have been a very good influence on students over the next 20 years. Even in his last 18 months, knowing he had incurable cancer, he got a lot of pleasure from life (see the photo) and from ideas, and he still continued to feel that, compared with most people born last century, on balance his life had been really lucky.” “Gary was serious, but with a dry and very droll sense of humour”, says Lewington. “He loved it in Oxford and he loved being in the CTSU.” Emberson agrees that Whitlock had found a home. “The CTSU was the perfect place for him to work”, he says. “He fitted in here.” Peto recalls Whitlock’s pleasure in the quirky. “Whenever I found some striking or odd observation in epidemiology I’d show it to Gary”, Peto recalls. “He’d really appreciate why it was interesting.” Whitlock’s determination to get things right persisted to the end, and included the words that would appear on his death certificate: “parotid adenocarcinoma ex pleomorphic adenoma”. This, he insisted, was what the death certificate should show. Nothing less precise would be acceptable.
Geoff Watts www.thelancet.com Vol 383 April 26, 2014