The Cochrane Lecture was set up in 1990 to honour the memory of Archie Cochrane and is given at the annual Scientific Meeting of the Society for Social Medicine. The Pemberton Lecture was set up in 2007 in honour of John Pemberton, founder of the Society in 1956. Cochrane and Pemberton Lecturers since 1990 have been as follows:
| 1990 | Peter Elwood | Archie Cochrane. |
| 1991 | Donald Acheson | Health, cities and the future. |
| 1992 | Iain Chalmers | Getting to grips with Archie Cochrane’s agenda. |
| 1993 | Klim McPherson | The best and the enemy of the good: assessing the role of patient choice in medical decision making. |
| 1994 | Stuart Kilpatrick | Tuberculosis – yesterday and today. |
| 1995 | Kay Dickersin | Consumer involvement in research. |
| 1996 | Alan Williams | All cost-effective treatments should be free! |
| 1997 | Julian Tudor Hart | What sorts of evidence do we need for evidence-based medicine. |
| 1998 | Ann Oakley | Social science and the experimenting society. |
| 1999 | Richard Lilford | What use are qualitative data when decisions have to be made? |
| 2000 | Nick Black | Evidence, policy, and evidence-based policy. |
| 2001 | Richard Peto | Halving premature death. |
| 2002 | Catherine Peckham | Science to policy: HIV and other fetal and childhood infections. |
| 2003 | Mildred Blaxter | Fish in water: social capital and the qualitative researcher. |
| 2004 | George Davey Smith | Randomised by (your) god: robust evidence from an observational study design. |
| 2005 | John Fox | Changing the information culture: a role for the Health and Social Care Information Centre. |
| 2006 | Martin McKee | Cochrane on communism; influence of ideology on search for evidence. |
| 2007 | Pemberton: Jørn Olsen | Recent Achievements and Challenges in Epidemiology. |
| Cochrane: Trevor Sheldon | Hen’s teeth: Watering down the evidence base for mass fluoridation and other public health and social interventions. | |
| 2008 | Pemberton: Paul Elliot | Small-area studies of environment & health. |
| Cochrane: Robert Beaglehole | Global Public Health: A scorecard. | |
| 2009 | Pemberton: Valerie Beral | The causes and prevention of breast cancer |
| Cochrane: Sally Macintyre | Good intentions and received wisdom are not good enough. | |
| 2010 | Pemberton: Johan Mackenbach | Can we reduce health inequalities? Some lessons from the English strategy (1998-2010) |
| Cochrane: Mark Petticrew | From evidence-based medicine to evidence-based everything: the irresistible rise of the systematic review | |
| 2011 | Pemberton: Debbie Lawlor | Developmental overnutrition – an old hypothesis with new importance? |
| Cochrane: Peter Groenewegen | Strengthening primary care in weak primary health care systems | |
| 2012 | Pemberton: Peter Whincup | Ethnicity and health — challenges and opportunities |
| Cochrane: Sue Ziebland | The Rise of ‘Patients’ Experiences’: Evidence, Distraction or Final Arbiter? | |
| 2013 | Pemberton: Raj Bhopal | To cause or not to cause that is the question: Should a WCEC take up arms against a sea of associations |
| Cochrane: Virginia Berridge | History: Is it evidence for public health policy | |
| 2014 | Pemberton: Di Kuh | The maturing of life course studies and epidemiology: Are we on track for healthy ageing? |
| Cochrane: Gerard Hastings | Resist Much, Obey Little | |
| 2015 | Pemberton: Cyrus Cooper | Prevention of osteoporotic fracture throughout the lifecourse |
| Cochrane: John Britton | How can changes in policy and practice put an end to death and disability from tobacco use? | |
| 2016 | Pemberton: Hilary Graham | Public Health in the Anthropocene |
| Cochrane: Catherine Law | Researching children’s futures: beyond motherhood and apple pie | |
| 2017 | Pemberton: Alastair Leyland | God bless the child: empty pockets and struggle to reduce inequalities in health |
| Cochrane: Jennie Popay | What happened to the ginger bread man: twenty years of qualitative evidence synthesis | |
| 2018 | Pemberton: Mel Bartley | “Probably, Minister”: Some reflections on the relationship between research & policy in Public Health |
| Cochrane: Kate Hunt | Gender in social medicine and public/population health: Increase visibility and diversification of ‘evidence’? | |
| 2019 | Pemberton: Kenneth Rothman | The End of Statistical Significance Questing |
| Cochrane: Margaret Whitehead | “Barely Believable” or Naked Truthful: What is the point of doing research on child poverty and health? | |
| 2020 | Pemberton: Harry Rutter | ‘Build back better’: The role of academia in translating optimistic slogan to meaningful action post COVID-19 |
| Cochrane: Danny Dorling | Constructing the story of 2020 – myths, miasma, messaging and models – from Cholera to COVID-19 | |
| 2021 | Pemberton: Clare Bambra | Unequal Pandemic: COVID-19 and Health Inequalities |
| Cochrane: Susan Michie | Applying behavioural science to managing COVID-19 | |
| 2022 | Pemberton: John Wright | A little less association, a little more action: new approaches to implementing and evaluating early life interventions |
| Cochrane: Linda Bauld | Covid19 and Covid recovery: Working together across sectors | |
| 2023 | Pemberton: Anthony Costello, | A Future for our Children? |
| Cochrane: Margaret McCartney | Evidence, the population and its individuals | |
| 2024 | Pemberton: Hazel Inskip | Epidemiology: past, present – and future? |
| Cochrane: John Lynch | Randomise until it hurts |