Plasma Vitamin C, $-Carotene, Lipids and Lipoproteins in Young Adult Smokers and Non-Smokers

Cigarette smoke has been implicated as a significant contributing factor in the development of chronic diseases. The adverse effect of smoking may elicit oxidative stress. This study was designed to assess the role of cigarette smoke on plasma vitamin C, $-carotene, lipids and lipoproteins in smokers. Sixty subjects consisting of thirty male active smokers with mean age of 37±1.84 years and thirty male non smokers with mean age of 34.6±2.3 years were selected for this study. The anthropometric indices and biochemical parameters were determined using standard procedures. The result shows that body mass index (BMI) (p<0.05) and plasma vitamin C (p<0.001) were significantly reduced in the smokers when compared with non-smokers. The plasma Total Cholesterol (TC), High Density Lipoprotein Cholesterol (HDLC), Low Density Lipoprotein (LDLC), Triglyceride (TG), and $-carotene were however not significantly different in smokers when compared with non Significant decreases were obtained in BMI and plasma vitamin C (p<0.001), $-carotene (p<0.01) Significant correlations were obtained between vitamin C and HDLC (r = 0.335, p<0.05), TC and LDLC (r = 0.923, p<0.01), body weight and BMI (r = 0.770, p<0.05) and TG and BMI (r = 0.570, p<0.02) in the smokers. Age was significantly correlated with TG (r = 0.601, p<0.05) and BMI (r = 0.362, p<0.01). This study that showed that reduced plasma vitamin C is associated with smoking. Because vitamin C plays important role in the maintenance of cellular antioxidants, active smokers should take vitamin C supplement to ameliorate the effect of cigarette smoke on cellular antioxidants.