Is Shisha Smoke Really Smoke?

[Tikhman]

There are academic studies (granted some came from tobacco companies, but still) that have shown with proper controls that burning cigarettes generate smoke that is more harmful to a person then cigarettes that don't burn the tobacco but vaporise it (eclipse cigarettes). If anyone want to read the actual papers, pm me and I'll email it to you.

As far as genetic predisposition, yes some people are more likely to get cancer, however, if you put enough carcinogens and other junk into your body, you will get it eventually.

[Giant Ninja Robot]

I'm not coming from a scientific point of view I'm using my senses. When have you ever seen shisha smoke dissapate like vapors do? It lingers in the air, and when you use too much heat it tastes of smoke. To get pure vapor there are way to many variables involved (heat management, wetness of shisha, etc.) to keep it at that point. I'm not agreeing or disagreeing with the possibility that vapor is involved I'm just going by what my senses tell me. And that is that it's mainly smoke. Someone should try capturing the smoke in a jar. If it's vapor shouldn't it condense into a liquid when contained in an airtight environment? Edited July 23, 2008 by giant ninja robot

[mikeypas]

Hi guys. had to chime in here. I definitely agree with greeknate88, if we are going to talk about scientific things, lets get our sources right. I don't have anything useful to add regarding the smoke vs vapor issue, but to whomever said that shisha smoking is not as harmful as cigarette smoking, I have to disagree.

now don't get me wrong, i love smoking my hookah, i have one every day! but i , like most of you, am not fooled into thinking its not as bad as cigs.
I present to you the WHO (world health organization) report on tobacco use in shisha.
http://repositories.cdlib.org/context/tc/a...pdf/viewcontent SOURCE: WHO

It's not a light read, its 88 pages PDF file. Here are some highlights:

Theuptake of tobacco nicotine is equivalent to 2–12 cigarettes per portion of tobacco
used (hagar). A regular user of waterpipes usually smokes several hagar
per session and on average smokes 2–3 sessions per day. This translates into
an intake of nicotine equivalent to more than one pack of cigarettes per session
for most waterpipe smokers. However, it is known that waterpipe smoking
produces more smoke than cigarette smoking, and it has been estimated that
smoke exposure could be as much as 100–200 cigarettes per session.

In addition, the temperature of burning tobacco in waterpipes is much lower
than that in cigarettes, and the force needed to pull air through the high resistance
of the water pathway permits the smoke to be inhaled very deeply
into the lungs. Therefore the sites and patterns of cell injury in the oral and
respiratory tracts are likely to be different from those due to cigarette smoking.

[ronald_dooley]

that report has been widely criticized. It's a bunch of crap that assumes that people smoke hookahs like cigarettes, combusting the shisha, for four hours at a time. The WHO report on hookah smoking is worth less than used toilet paper.

[ronald_dooley]

According to that stupid WHO report, done by a bunch of doctors who have never smoked hookahs... one session of hookah is equal to as much as 200 cigarettes?

I'd be laughing right now if I wasn't already crying at how stupid this report is...

[amnite]

And I present to you:

A Critique of the WHO's TobReg "Advisory Note" entitled: "Waterpipe Tobacco Smoking: Health Effects, Research Needs and Recommended Actions by Regulators"

http://www.jnrbm.com/content/5/1/17

The 7 FATAL ERRORS in THE WHO (World Health Organization) REPORT on
""Waterpipe"" Tobacco Smoking

http://narghilecommuniques.googlepages.com/whoreport

Edit:
While I was replying "ronald_dooley" replied, I agree with him Edited July 23, 2008 by amnite

[ilikemyusername]

as much as 100–200 cigarettes per session.

so, 5 packs to a carton per bowl of shisha, i tried to put down a carton one day, i didn't even come close. somewhere around 4 and a half packs it was time to go to sleep, and when i woke up the next day my lungs HURT!.
typically when i smoke shisha, my lungs feel good the next day, like they're "lubricated"
i'm claiming that shisha is good for you, wether its smoke, or vapor, or an emulsion of dust and glue, i like it and i think it has some medical value we don't yet quite understand.

[mattarios2]

as much as 100–200 cigarettes per session.

so, 5 packs to a carton per bowl of shisha, i tried to put down a carton one day, i didn't even come close. somewhere around 4 and a half packs it was time to go to sleep, and when i woke up the next day my lungs HURT!.
typically when i smoke shisha, my lungs feel good the next day, like they're "lubricated"
i'm claiming that shisha is good for you, wether its smoke, or vapor, or an emulsion of dust and glue, i like it and i think it has some medical value we don't yet quite understand.

that would be awesome, doctors would recommend us to smoke as much as possible, it is medicine, vitamins, it makes us healthy !!! F*uck an apple a day, it is a hookah a day or 5 .

[ronald_dooley]

yeah, talk about it. I can't believe that some researcher was so f***ing ignorant of hookah that he came to the scientific conclusion that smoking one bowl of shisha is the equivalent of smoking 200 cigarettes.

I mean... FOR THE LOVE OF GOD. I used to smoke cigarettes! I can smoke maximum maybe 3 or 4 back to back under normal circumstances. 10 packs, back-to-back in 2 hours? I think that would kill me!

Like almost anything that these international organizations do, there was some serious politics behind it. Someone wanted to smear shisha... and so smear shisha they did!

I don't trust anything that comes out of the diseased corridors of the UN or their stupid committees.

- Ronald

[Giant Ninja Robot]

And I present to you:

A Critique of the WHO's TobReg "Advisory Note" entitled: "Waterpipe Tobacco Smoking: Health Effects, Research Needs and Recommended Actions by Regulators"

http://www.jnrbm.com/content/5/1/17

The 7 FATAL ERRORS in THE WHO (World Health Organization) REPORT on
""Waterpipe"" Tobacco Smoking

http://narghilecommuniques.googlepages.com/whoreport

Edit:
While I was replying "ronald_dooley" replied, I agree with him

These were really good reads and blew huge holes in WHO's study. I'm amazed that the study was even allowed published and taken at word by the media. On second though no I'm not. Not at all. EVERYONE IN THIS FORUM SHOULD READ THESE ARTICLES!

"The quantity of tar obviously depends on the inhalation frequency. For instance two important, not cited, studies dealt with tumbâk [9,10] and used different puffing parameters than the recent one that relied on tobamel (tobacco-molasses smoking mixture, called "mu'essel" in Arabic)[8]. The discrepancies in results are striking: the two former found a reduction by c. 50% of the tar (smoke compared with that produced by a narghile with no water inside) while the latter succeeded in producing impressive amounts of it: 802 mg for a one-hour session. The explanation lies in the fact that, in the last case, the laboratory model completely differed from actual human hookah smoking. Only a small quantity of the smoking mixture was used: 10 g instead of the average 20 g according to an important work by Hadidi [11]. The coal, of the quick-lighting type, of unknown chemical composition, was kept in the same place over the tobacco-molasses mixture during the whole session, that is, almost one hour, versus 45 min [<A href="http://www.jnrbm.com/content/5/1/17#B11">11]. This is contrary to the normal practice that involves moving it around in order to avoid "charring" the product."


WOW and so much more. They used an effin smoking robot instead of a human smoker not accounting for any variables in a session. Basically it would be the equivelent of chiefing for an hour on 10g of shisha never moving your coal and smoking past the burning point of the shisha. Sounds like the world's shitiest session to me.

[ronald_dooley]

They used an effin smoking robot instead of a human smoker not accounting for any variables in a session. Basically it would be the equivelent of chiefing for an hour on 10g of shisha never moving your coal and smoking past the burning point of the shisha. Sounds like the world's shitiest session to me.

More like the world's shittiest report.

[Giant Ninja Robot]

agreed 100% I'm no conspiracy theorist but there's no way alterior motives weren't behind this study.

[PatronHookah]

I think it is vapor, smoke, fog, clouds, and just all around dank-0-ness