Can combination of TB and smooking cause lung cancer?
SPD WRLD- Relax! There is almost zero connection between a lung scar from TB and the cancer caused by smoking. They are different types of lung cancer. Smoking leads to the most common type = squamous cell carcinoma. Another type of lung cancer which rarely develops in an old scar is the type called adenocarcinoma. The TB scar, very common in millions of healthy people usually is found on the outer surface of a lung lobe. The smoker’s cancer mainly starts in the central part of the lung in the bronchi, near the trachea. So, yes, you are making sense, and you do not have to worry that an old TB lung scar will become a lung cancer from smoking. Of course, stopping smoking is perhaps the wisest thing for you to do.
