Ventilatory capacity of miners.

To the Editor.— Dr. Hunter's letter (224:1042, 1973) has recently been called to our attention. It contains several unwarranted assertions that need correction. We, unlike Dr. Hunter, drew no conclusions (nor even any inferences) from the data we cited. All we did was answer certain questions that had been asked of us. An ex cathedra statement in Dr. Hunter's letter implies that coal miners have worse than average lung functions and more than average frequency and multiplicity of chest symptoms than do nonminers. The basis for this statement comes from "carefully structured" but uncited data and unreferenced publications. The true picture is far from as clear as Dr. Hunter would lead us to believe. There have been only two published studies conducted in the United States in which the ventilatory capacity of a population of coal miners has been compared to a suitable control population. The first was reported by