Richard Peto

Sir Richard Peto (born 14 May 1943)

Education He attended Taunton's School in Southampton and subsequently studied the Natural Sciences Tripos at Trinity College, Cambridge followed by a Master of Science degree in Statistics at Imperial College London. He was elected a Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences (FMedSci) in 1998. He was knighted for his services to epidemiology and to cancer prevention in 1999, and he received an honorary Doctor of Medical Sciences degree from Yale University in 2011.

Personal life His brother Julian Peto, with whom he has published work in mathematical statistics (e.g. on the logrank test), is also a distinguished epidemiologist.

Selected publications

Peto R, Schneiderman M, eds. Quantification of occupational cancer. Cold Spring Harbor, NY: Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, 1981. .

Peto R, zur Hausen H, eds. Viral etiology of cervical cancer. Cold Spring Harbor, NY: Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, 1986. .

Peto R, Imperial Cancer Research Fund (Great Britain), World Health Organization, et al. Mortality from smoking in developed countries, 1950–2000: indirect estimates from national vital statistics. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 1994. .