By Fazeena Saleem
DOHA: Smoking shisha (water pipe) increases the chances of having different types of cancer, according to a recent study by a team led by two researchers at Weill Cornell Medicine Qatar (WCM-Q). The study also reveals that the types of cancers reported in shisha smokers are similar to the types of tumours observed in cigarette smokers.
The team of researchers led by Dr Ravinder Mamtani and Dr Sohaila Cheema, used a sophisticated meta-analysis technique to review 28 published scientific studies and examined the relationship between shisha smoking and various forms of cancer, including cancer of the head and neck, esophagus (food pipe), stomach, lung and bladder.
According to high-quality studies retrieved, shisha smoking was associated with about 95 percent risk of head and neck cancer as well as esophageal and lung cancer. Increased risk was also observed for stomach and bladder cancer but based mainly on poor-quality studies.
Dr Mamtani, Associate Dean for Global and Public Health, WCM-Q, said the need for such a study had become urgent in recent years owing to the surge in popularity of shisha, especially among young people and women.
“Many studies are examining the risks of cigarette smoking,” Dr Mamtani added.
“But we must understand that smoking from a shisha is significantly different because the smoker generally inhales far more smoke, smokes for longer, and there are different concentrations of toxins in shisha smoke than in cigarette smoke.
“There is also a very dangerous and frankly wrong perception that shisha smoking is safe because the water somehow filters out the dangerous toxins in the smoke. I cannot emphasise enough that this is not true. The water only cools the smoke, it does not filter out the toxins,” he said.
Unpublished WCM-Q data indicates that among Qatar’s adolescents aged 15-18 years, 13 percent reported they had tried cigarettes and 22 percent said they had tried shisha. Among college students, 27 percent said they were regular or social cigarette smokers and 32 percent regular or social shisha smokers. “Shisha smoking is a very social act and in the Middle East it is more socially acceptable for women than smoking cigarettes. This means that patterns of use are different from cigarette smoking so it is vital that we study the use of shisha separately to understand the risks more clearly,” said Dr Cheema, Director, Global and Public Health, WCM-Q.
The study also suggests that more high-quality studies would be necessary to properly assess the risks of other forms of cancer. Controlling the impending epidemic of shisha smoking will require combined efforts of health educators, legislators, public health officials and research scientists. The study has been supported by WCM-Q’s Department of Global and Public Health and Biomedical Research Programme funded by Qatar Foundation.
The Peninsula
