Hookah is a water pipe that passes tobacco smoke through
water before it's inhaled. The water, however, does not filter out any toxins
and is just as harmful as cigarettes. Hookah is usually smoked in a group and
has a variety of attractive flavors like mint, cherry, apple or coconut. The
mix of the social setting and candy-like names of hookah are likely one reason
for its growing popularity among kids. According to a study by the American
Cancer Society in 2012, among high school seniors, 17 percent have smoked
hookah in the past year.
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Because of the setting, a group can spend, on average, an
hour smoking hookah, making it equivalent to about 200 puffs per person. It
takes about 20 puffs to smoke a cigarette, so only one hour of smoking hookah
is equivalent to smoking 10 cigarettes. Hookah contains tobacco and high levels
of carbon monoxide from the charcoal heating the tobacco. There is a false
belief that hookah is not as harmful as cigarettes but, in actuality, hookah
smoke has the same harmful effects that cigarettes do. In fact, hookah can be
more harmful because of the longer time spent smoking it.
In most states, kids need to be at least 18 to purchase and
smoke hookah. However, most hookah bars in the United States do not require
kids to be 18 to enter the premises. So it's not uncommon to see underage teens
in a hookah bar having easy access to smoke and being exposed to second hand
smoke.
Bottom line: Talk to your kids about the harm of smoking
hookah. They may not realize it's just as bad for them as smoking cigarettes.
Pioneer educator Dr. Michael Popkin, the longtime spokesman
for Lorillard's Youth Smoking Prevention Program, Real Parents, Real Answers,
is the founder of Active Parenting Publishers and is the author of many award
winning video-based parenting education programs.
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