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Kids Exposed to Smoke More Likely to Carry Strep

March 10, 2006

• Bank Stopped From Enabling Online Tobacco Sales • Study Finds Big Tobacco Exploiting Ad Ban Loophole • Do Tobacco Firms Cut Menthol to Hook Young Smokers? • Wegmans, DeCicco Markets Ditch Cigarettes • Secondhand Smoke Linked To Hospital Admissions • Anti-Smoking Drug Chantix Linked to Seizures, Heart Problems, Diabetes • Congress Moves To Tighten Tobacco Controls • Toddlers Affected Most By Secondhand Smoke at Home • Tobacco 'Innovations' Aimed at Younger Smokers • Heart Attacks Drop After Smoking Ban in Italy • Physician Highlights Hazards of Bartending • Anti-Smoking Suit Targets Restaurants • Smoking Linked to Sleep Disturbances • States Challenge R.J. Reynolds Cigarette Ads • Smokers Cost Taxpayers $10 Billion • Secondhand Smoke a Serious Health Risk • Would Women Rather Smoke Than Get Fat? • Kroger Agrees to Curb Tobacco Sales to Minors • No More Free Smokes in California • Second-Hand Smoke Tied to Lower Test Scores • Secondhand Smoke Bad for Pets • Researchers Link Smoking To Dementia • Smoking Turns On Genes -- Permanently • Bill Targets Online Cigarette Sellers • UK Tries Nicotine Patches on Pregnant Smokers • More Toxins Found in Smokers' Children --- • More about Smoking & Health

Many of the medical risks associated with smoking, such as cancer, emphysema and heart attacks, are well-known. Here's a new one: more children exposed to tobacco smoke carry a form of strep than children who aren't around smokers.

According to an article in the April 1 issue of Clinical Infectious Diseases, Streptococcus pneumoniae often exists in the nose and throat, and children are more likely than adults to carry it.

If the bacteria, also called pneumococci, grow out of control, infection can result in minor illnesses like ear infections or lead to more serious diseases like sinusitis, pneumonia and meningitis.

Researchers in Israel conducted a surveillance study of more than 200 young children and their mothers. They swabbed the noses and throats of the subjects to determine bacterial carriage rates, and then analyzed the data based on the children's and mothers' exposure to smoking. Seventy-six percent of the children exposed to tobacco smoke carried pneumococci, compared to 60 percent of those not exposed.

Exposed children were also more likely than non-exposed children to carry pneumococcal serotypes responsible for most of the invasive S. pneumoniae disease.

In the mothers, differences were also noted -- 32 percent of mothers who smoked carried S. pneumoniae, compared with 15 percent of mothers who were exposed to smoking and 12 percent of mothers not exposed to smoking.

Higher carriage rates of bacteria can translate to higher rates of infection, according to lead author David Greenberg, MD.

"Since carriage in the nose is the first step in causing disease, the increased rate of carriage suggests more frequent occurrence of the disease. Indeed, active and passive smoking are associated with increased rate of respiratory infectious diseases," Greenberg said.

The researchers hope their data will persuade parents to quit smoking, particularly around children.

"Smoking parents, especially smoking mothers ... jeopardize their children's health" by putting them at higher risk for invasive and respiratory infections, Greenberg said.

"This should definitely encourage the parents not to smoke in the presence of their child, especially if this child has predisposing factors such as asthma," he said.

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