— Christine M. Kukka, Project Manager, HBV Advocate
Smoking appears to hamper the effectiveness of hepatitis B
immunization as well as increase the risk of developing a chronic
infection in those who are infected by HBV, according to a report by
researchers in Bangladesh, published in the February issue of the
journal Viral Immunology.
Hepatitis B vaccination works by injecting only a
piece of the virus–the hepatitis B surface antigen–in order to promote
development of protective surface antibodies. When researchers
compared the levels of surface antibodies in vaccinated smokers to
those in non-smokers, they found smokers’ rates of protective levels of
antibodies were almost nine times lower than among vaccinated
non-smokers.
Among people who have been infected by the virus,
it appears that non-smokers are more likely to clear the infection and
develop surface antibodies on their own than are smokers.
The researchers identified 132 people who had
been infected, evidenced by the presence of the hepatitis B core
antibody. Only 44 (33.3%) of these infected patients cleared the
infection and developed surface antibodies. The researchers found that
HBV-infected cigarette smokers had much lower rates of clearing the
infection than non-smokers.
“These data suggest that surface antibody
development, either naturally or after vaccination, is significantly
lower among smokers,” they wrote. The study underscores the importance
of measuring surface antibody levels in smokers following immunization
to see if adequate protective levels of antibodies have developed, and
whether a booster vaccine is required to confer protection against the
infection.
Source: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed
/25714135
http://www.hbvadvocate.org/news/HBJ12.3.htm
Labels: cigarette smoking, effects of smoking
