Sheesha: iT’S NOT THAT HARMLESS, YOU KNOW!

According to a Pakistani research published in Indian Journal of Health and Wellbeing on seesha smoking, 40 percent of Pakistani male students puff the water pipe. The study was coauthored by Sadaf Ahmad of KU, Asma Bashir of SZABIST, Haroon Ahmad of PU, Shamoon Naushad of AEIRC, and Ghaffar Memon of NED Universities. The final draft said that in Pakistani universities 40 percent male students were sheesha smokers, of whom 38.7 percent smoke out of frustration, 21.4 percent smoke for pleasure, 16.2 percent smoke to gain attention of girls, 12.9 per cent smoke because they have nothing else to do in their leisure time and 8.06 per cent smoke to release stress. Seesha smoking cafes are mushrooming all over the country and their client base are students not more than 24-year-olds. Federal Urdu University of Arts, Science and Technology professor Sikandar Sherwani was the mentor of the study. A total number of 400 students of various universities were taken as the sample. 170 of the 400 were seesha smokers. Moreover, 58.8 percent acquired the habit during their university life, 23.5 per cent acquired it in their colleges and 17.6 percent started smoking since school days. Regarding medical complications associated with water pipe consumption 47.17 per cent of Sheesha consuming students complained of respiratory problems. Whereas many teenagers and young adults view sheesha smoking to be an ‘in’ thing, the fact remains that it does not come without a risk. Research by University of Leister has shown that sheesha smoking is nowhere more safer than smoking cigarettes. Recently, city district governments all over the country, especially in Lahore, Karachi and Islamabad have launched operations against sheesha smoking dens. Citizens, too, have asked the concerned authorities to take this matter seriously. However, the change has to come from within the youth since there will always exist illegal ways of obtaining and smoking sheesha. Parents and guardians, too, will have to play a deeper role in eradicating this menace from the society.
FACTS ABOUT SHEESHA: Waterpipe smokers are at risk of the same kind of diseases as are caused by cigarette smoking, including cancer, heart disease, respiratory disease and adverse effects during pregnancy.
• Using a waterpipe to smoke tobacco poses a serious potential health hazard to smokers and others exposed to the smoke.
• Sheesha smoke contains high levels of chemicals and poisons, including carbon monoxide, tar and heavy metals.
• Many of these chemicals are known to cause mouth and lung cancers, heart disease, respiratory and other diseases.
Even though it has passed through water, the levels of toxins in sheesha smoke can be as high or higher than in cigarette smoke.
• Water-pipe smokers may absorb higher concentrations of these chemicals because of higher concentrations in the smoke itself, or because they may smoke for several hours at a time and may inhale moisturized, less irritating smoke more deeply.
• In a sheesha session lasting 60 minutes, a smoker can inhale as much smoke as a cigarette smoker would inhale from 100 – 200 cigarettes.
• Second-hand smoke from sheesha is an extremely harmful mixture of tobacco smoke and smoke from the fuel (charcoal).
• Non smokers, particularly pregnant women, babies, children and the elderly are at risk from breathing in sheesha smoke.
Using a waterpipe to smoke tobacco is NOT a safe alternative to cigarette smoking.