A BETTER HYPOTHESIS TO EXPLAIN THE OBSERVED STATISTICAL ASSOCIATION BETWEEN GUM DISEASE AND CARDIOVASCULAR DISEASE IS AS FOLLOWS:

I had the experience of catching a nasty respiratory virus (very likely a coxsackievirus B), which also spread around my social group.

THIS VIRUS THEN PRECIPITATED BOTH GUM DISEASE AND CARDIOVASCULAR PROBLEMS in several of the people who were infected by it.

Having observed how this virus rapidly caused both periodontal and cardiovascular problems (specifically: heart attacks, myocarditis and pericarditis) in several infected individuals, I would suggest  that rather than the now debunked hypothesis of oral bacteria migrating from the gums to the heart and therein causing cardiovascular damage, a much better explanatory hypothesis is that A CHRONIC VIRAL INFECTION CAUSES BOTH PERIODONTAL AND HEART DISEASE SIMULTANEOUSLY.

That is to say: gum disease does not directly cause cardiovascular disease; rather a chronic viral infection is the singular etiological underpinning of both, and this single viral cause explains why gum disease is statically associated with cardiovascular disease.

Coxsackievirus B infection is well known to cause heart attacks, myocarditis and pericarditis; and viral infections can undermine and degrade the connective tissue of the gums by the fact that such infections can generate connective tissue-degrading enzymes (like MMP-9 and others).