The Challenge of Oral Health in HIV Disease

By Steven Abel, D.D.S., M.S.

Another Reason To Stop Smoking...
As if the case against smoking weren't strong enough, a new study offers HIV-positive smokers even more incentive to give up the toxic, malodorous habit.

Dr. Mark D. Wewers and his colleagues at Ohio State University have published an article in a recent issue of the American Journal of Respiratory Critical Care, showing that cigarette smoking may suppress the percentage and absolute number of CD4+ and CD8+ cells in the bronchoalveolar lavage fluid in HIV-positive patients. These reduced numbers of immune cells may in turn lead to impairments in lung defenses against infection.

Scientists have long tied smoking by HIV-positive persons to a number of oral diseases, including oral candidasis, hairy leukoplakia, and bacterial pneumonia. HIV-positive pregnant women who smoke are thought to be more likely to transmit HIV to their child. In addition, some association has been seen between smoking and risk of AIDS dementia.

And if the demonstrated health risks of smoking and the tobacco industry's support for legislators that are well-known to be no friends of people with AIDS isn't enough to prevent HIV-positive people from lighting up...well, it is a truth almost universally acknowledged that kissing a smoker is like licking an ashtray, though admittedly the research on this datum has not yet been published.