Cite as: 538 U. S. 135 (2003)
Opinion of Kennedy, J.
smokers with asbestosis. While these statistics might at first appear to provide the beginning of an argument for giving asbestosis sufferers recovery for fear, the average American male has a 44 percent chance of developing cancer during the course of his life, and his chance of dying from some form of cancer is more than 21 percent. See L. Ries et al., National Cancer Institute, SEER Cancer Statistics Rev., 1973-1999, Tables I-15, I-16 (2002), available at http://seer. cancer.gov/csr/1973_1999/overview.pdf (as visited Feb. 10, 2003) (available in Clerk of Court's case file). This literature also suggests that a person who smokes has more than a 50 percent chance of dying from a disease caused by tobacco use, see National Cancer Institute, Changes in Cigarette-Related Disease Risks & Their Implication for Prevention and Control, Smoking & Tobacco Control Monograph, No. 8, 1997, p. xi, Table 1, a risk that all but one of the respondents has incurred that is wholly separate from their exposure to asbestos.
It is beyond the ability of juries to derive from statistics like these a fair estimate of the danger caused by negligent exposure to asbestos. See Metro-North, supra, at 435. For this reason, the trial judge was correct to instruct the jury that they could not award the respondents any damages for cancer or for an increased risk of cancer. In disallowing recovery for risk but allowing recovery for fear based on that risk, however, the trial judge attempted to avoid speculation at the outset but succumbed to added speculation in the end. If instructing a jury to calculate an increased risk of cancer invites speculation, then asking the jury to infer from its estimate a rough sense of the fear based on the risk invites speculation compounded.
The damages the jury awarded in this case indicate the legitimacy of these concerns. As described above, supra, at 167, the respondents received damages of between $500,000 and $1.2 million despite having complained only that they suffered shortness of breath and experienced varying de-
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