Nathan Mantel (February 16, 1919 – May 25, 2002) was an American biostatistician best known for his work with William Haenszel, which led to the Mantel–Haenszel test and its associated estimate, the Mantel–Haenszel

odds ratio An odds ratio (OR) is a statistic that quantifies the strength of the association between two events, A and B. The odds ratio is defined as the ratio of the odds of A in the presence of B and the odds of A in the absence of B, or equivalently (du ...

. The Mantel–Haenszel procedure and its extensions allow data from several sources or groups to be combined while avoiding

confounding In statistics, a confounder (also confounding variable, confounding factor, extraneous determinant or lurking variable) is a variable that influences both the dependent variable and independent variable, causing a spurious association. Con ...

. He spent much of his career working for the

National Cancer Institute The National Cancer Institute (NCI) coordinates the United States National Cancer Program and is part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), which is one of eleven agencies that are part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. T ...

. During his career, he published over 380 academic papers. Later in his life, Mantel was known for defending the

tobacco industry The tobacco industry comprises those persons and companies who are engaged in the growth, preparation for sale, shipment, advertisement, and distribution of tobacco and tobacco-related products. It is a global industry; tobacco can grow in any ...

against claims that

passive smoking Passive smoking is the inhalation of tobacco smoke, called secondhand smoke (SHS), or environmental tobacco smoke (ETS), by persons other than the intended "active" smoker. It occurs when tobacco smoke enters an environment, causing its inhala ...

was harmful.

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Further reading