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 Even in the rooms adjacent to where people smoked hookah, air
pollution levels were much higher than in rooms where cigarettes
were actively smoked, researchers report in the journal Tobacco
Control.
“There are widespread misconceptions that hookah is a safer
alternative to cigarettes,” said lead author Dr. Michael Weitzman, a
professor at New York University School of Medicine.
“Smoking hookahs (water pipes) at home can be terribly dangerous for
the smoker, but perhaps more importantly, for children and other
people living in the home,” Weitzman told Reuters Health by email.
During one hookah-smoking session, a smoker can inhale the
equivalent of the smoke from 150 cigarettes, according to the U.S.
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Hookahs are among alternative tobacco products like chewing tobacco
whose use has been on the rise in the U.S., especially among young
people, the study authors note. Among high school students, 14
percent of girls and 15 percent of boys said they had used a hookah
in 2014, as did one quarter of young adults in 2015.
To determine the effect smoking has on indoor environments, the
study team collected air samples from 33 homes in Dubai: 11 where
only hookah smoking occurred, 12 with only cigarette smoking and 10
with no smoking at all.
The study team sampled the air quality in the rooms where people
smoked and in an adjacent room during about one hour of hookah or
cigarette smoking, and compared the readings to nonsmoking homes.
The researchers used air filters to measure levels of carbon
monoxide, black carbon and pollution particles 2.5 microns or
smaller (PM 2.5), which can penetrate deep into the lungs and enter
the bloodstream.
During sampling sessions, there were between one and four active
hookah smokers, with an average of 1.7, and one to five active
cigarette smokers, with an average of 2.3.
In rooms where hookahs were being smoked, carbon monoxide levels
averaged 11 parts per million and the PM 2.5 level was 489
micrograms per cubic meter of air. In the adjacent room, carbon
monoxide levels averaged 5.8 ppm and PM 2.5 pollution was 211
micrograms/m3.
In rooms with cigarette smoking, carbon monoxide averaged 2.3 ppm
and PM 2.5 averaged 201 micrograms. Levels in the adjacent room were
about half.
In nonsmoking homes, carbon monoxide levels averaged 1.5 ppm while
PM 2.5 levels averaged 93 micrograms. Black carbon levels during
active smoking were 5.4 micrograms/m3 with active hookah smoking,
4.2 with active cigarette smoking and 2.1 in nonsmoking homes.
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There is no regulatory standard for black carbon levels, the authors
write, but the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency says being
exposed to more than 9 ppm of carbon monoxide over an eight-hour
period is unsafe and the World Health Organization limits PM 2.5
exposure in outdoor air to 35 micrograms/m3 over 24 hours.
“Hookah smoking has been increasing in the U.S. and worldwide for
the past decade,” said Thomas Eissenberg, a professor at Virginia
Commonwealth University who studies tobacco use.
People are not as aware of the risks as they should be, and many
mistakenly believe that passing smoke through water will reduce the
health risks, he added.
“Even when the smoke has passed through water, which makes it cooler
and easier to inhale, that smoke still contains many of the same
carcinogens as cigarette smoke,” Eissenberg said by email.
Eissenberg advised current hookah smokers to quit or to seek help
with their habit. “If you are using a hookah at home, you are
putting yourself and all members of your family at risk for
tobacco-caused disease,” he said.
Wietzman noted that pregnant women, people with heart and lung
problems, and people with low iron levels are particularly at risk
for poisoning from carbon monoxide.
“Hookah smoking, especially in the home, has the potential to be
profoundly dangerous to the smoker, children, pregnant women, and
all individuals who reside in or visit such homes,” Weitzman said.
SOURCE: bit.ly/2fLBHq3 Tobacco Control, online October 26, 2016.
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