Andrew Furber and colleagues at the South East Sheffield Primary Care Trust reviewed about 3,500 studies and said smokers were 60-300 percent more likely to acquire HIV as compared to non-smokers.

'We know tobacco can enter the bloodstream and affect the immune system.' Furber said. He said studies had already shown that tobacco is linked to an increased risk in sexually transmitted infections, but his latest analysis reveals a link to HIV.

'More research clearly needs to be done in this area. As the tobacco market is squeezed in the developed world, the tobacco industry increasingly looks to Asia, Eastern Europe and Africa.

'And these are the places where the HIV epidemic is at its greatest. So if there is this interaction, it is important to know about, because it could affect the way we run public health programmes in developing countries,' said Furber.

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