Heavy Smoking and Sodium Chloride Hypogeusia

¹ New York City, New York

The lingual taste buds of people smoking two or more packages of cigarettes appeared to be insensitive to amounts of NaCl identified by nonsmokers. The smokers required concentrations 12 to 14 times greater than the N/2 solution of NaCl required for identification by the 85 percent of the controls. A compensating increase in daily salt intake may contribute to an increase in dcardiovascular-renal disease associated with heavy smoking.