Mouth bacteria as the cause of Paget's disease of bone

The many viruses associated with Pagetic osteoclasts could be opportunistic rather than causative. Some mouth bacteria can lyse bone. One (Actinobacil lus actinomycetemcomitans) can grow and even multiply inside human cell lin es in culture, producing osteolytic materials - one 62 kDa protein having a potency in the picomolar range. A small focus of this, or of one of the ot her periodontitis-causing bacteria, in a bone might gradually spread its in fluence to activate osteoclasts - the first stage in Paget's disease. The f ocus in each bone might be small and easily overlooked, as other intracellu lar bacteria have been in the past.