14 DAY TRIAL // Casual or secondhand smokers are also exposed to future lung disease, a new research from physician-scientists at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center finds.
Cigarette smoke, even in low-levels, can damage the lungs and individuals could develop future lung cancer or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), say the authors of the study, which could be a support for future public smoking bans.
For this research, Dr. Ronald Crystal, senior author of the study and chief of the division of pulmonary and critical care medicine at NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell and chair of the department of genetic medicine at Weill Cornell Medical College in New York City, tested 121 people from three different categories: nonsmokers, active smokers and low exposure smokers.
Along with his collaborators, Dr Crystal tested urine levels of nicotine and cotinine, the markers of cigarette smoking within the body, before scanning each person's genome to see which genes were active or not in the cells lining the airways.
They found that all nicotine and cotinine levels were related to genetic abnormalities, and Dr Crystal said that “this means that no level of smoking, or exposure to secondhand smoke, is safe.”
He compares these genetic changes to a “canary in a coal mine,” warning of potential life-threatening disease, “but the canary is chirping for low-level exposure patients, and screaming for active smokers.”
Previous studies have already established that secondhand smoke is dangerous, but this is the first one that shows what it does to the body at a gene function level, e! Science News reports.
“Even at the lowest detectable levels of exposure, we found direct effects on the functioning of genes within the cells lining the airways,” said Dr. Ronald Crystal, explaining that genes, usually activated within the cells of heavy smokers, are also turned on or off in those with very low-level exposure.
“The genetic effect is much lower than those who are regular smokers, but this does not mean that there are no health consequences,” he says.
“Certain genes within the cells lining the airways are very sensitive to tobacco smoke, and changes in the function of these genes are the first evidence of 'biological disease' in the lungs or individuals.”
The study was published in the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine.