TB and Tobacco - An Unholy Alliance

Abstract

Tobacco smoking amplifies the negative impact of Tuberculosis (TB) on population health. TB patients who continue to smoke have much worse treatment outcomes than those who quit. On the other hand, TB patients are also more likely to quit than general smokers if given appropriate advice andsupport. In this editorial, we discuss how smoking worsens TB outcomes, show how simple and cheap interventions can help TB patients quit smokingsuccessfully and suggest how to sustain such measures within a resource-constrained health system.