New discovery shows cigarettes full of disease causing bacteria

Researchers from France have used a technique called DNA microassay to find that cigarettes are full of a variety of disease causing bacteria. In the past, scientists used small pieces of cigarettes and lab cultures to test cigarettes for bacterial contamination. Some of the disease causing bacteria also found in soil, responsible for food-borne illness and respiratory infections could have widespread implications for human health.
Cigarettes studied, all containing the same diversity of bacteria, included Camel, Kool Filter Kings, Lucky Strike Original Red, and Marlboro Red cigarettes.
According to Professor Amy R. Sapkota who led the research, "We were quite surprised to identify such a wide variety of human bacterial pathogens in these products. The commercially-available cigarettes that we tested were chock full of bacteria, as we had hypothesized, but we didn't think we'd find so many that are infectious in humans.” One such bacterium found in the cigarettes - Pseudomonas aeruginosa - is also responsible for ten percent of hospital acquired infections, and common among immunocompromised patients.
Bacteria related to anthrax, food borne illness, and lung infections were present in cigarettes - including Clostridium, Klebsiella and Acinetobacter. The scientists found "hundreds' of bacteria in cigarettes.
Dr. Sapkota suggests that bacteria can survive the smoking process. She says there are as many bacteria in cigarettes as there are chemicals.
If bacteria found in cigarettes do survive the smoking process, Sapkota says "they could possibly go on to contribute to both infectious and chronic illnesses in both smokers and individuals who are exposed to environmental tobacco smoke, so it's critical that we learn more about the bacterial content of cigarettes, which are used by more than a billion people worldwide."
The study comes from University of Maryland environmental health researcher and microbial ecologists at the Ecole Centrale de Lyon in France and is published in Environmental Health Perspectives. Cigarettes contain bacteria previously unknown that could also cause disease in humans from direct and second hand exposure to cigarette smoke.