Talking about home testing for HIV

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Curious001

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Smoking

Hello I’m wondering if you could help answer my question.
I took 3 of your tests and received a negative result on all 3 times (done after window period). And I was just wondering if whether smoking cigarettes is known to affect the result? Like would it affect my body’s ability to make enough antibodies to be detected by your test. I don’t classify myself as a smoker at all however my roommate was a heavy smoker and I was always around him in the month of Jan and a bit of feb (during my possible window period). I did also have one or two cigarettes with the odd drink.
Can I rely on my negative results and put this worry behind me?
Also worth mentioning is that the last test I took was at 7 months post possible exposure.

1 Responses

Becky, BioSure UK Ltd
 Work on 17th September 2021

Hi Curious001, Your negative result 7 months post exposure is reliable, accurate and conclusive - you do not need to retest. Smoking cigarettes will have no effect on the result of the test. Substances in tobacco smoke are not known to cause any cross-interference or delay HIV antibody production. You can rely on your negative result and can put this behind you. Hope this helps, all the best, Becky

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