Active Cigarette Smoking Is Associated With an Exacerbation of Genetic Susceptibility to Diabetes

Abstract

The heritability levels of two traits for diabetes diagnosis, serum fasting glucose (FG) and glycated hemoglobin (HbA1c), were estimated to be 51–62%. Studies have shown that cigarette smoking is a modifiable risk factor for diabetes. It is important to uncover whether smoking may modify the genetic risk of diabetes. This study included unrelated Taiwan Biobank subjects in a discovery cohort (TWB1) of 25,460 subjects and a replication cohort (TWB2) of 58,774 subjects. Genetic risk score (GRS) of each TWB2 subject was calculated with weights retrieved from the TWB1 analyses. We then assessed the significance of GRS-smoking interactions on FG, HbA1c, and diabetes while adjusting for covariates. A total of five smoking measurements were investigated, including active smoking status, pack-years, years as a smoker, packs smoked per day, and hours as a passive smoker per week. Except for passive smoking, all smoking measurements were associated with FG, HbA1c, and diabetes (P < 0.0033) and were associated with an exacerbation of the genetic risk of FG and HbA1c (PInteraction < 0.0033). For example, each 1 SD increase in GRS is associated with a 1.68% higher FG in subjects consuming one more pack of cigarettes per day (PInteraction = 1.9 × 10–7). Smoking cessation is especially important for people who are more genetically predisposed to diabetes.