Major Diseases Caused by Shisha Smoking

It is a known fact that smoking cigarettes or shisha involves numerous major health risks for smokers.
In the United States alone, nearly one in five deaths, or an estimated 440,000 deaths per year, attributed to smoking. Approximately, half of all Americans who continue to smoke die due to smoking-related complications. And smoking comes from various ways among which is smoking hookah.
According to the medical experts, a recent study states that a hookah pipe may act as a medium for transferring dangerous bacterium causing infectious diseases such as Hepatitis A. This places people who smoke shisha at a higher risk than just smoking regular cigarettes especially when the shisha pipe is used by multiple smokers.

Here are lists of major diseases caused by smoking shisha:

Cancer

Smokers are more likely to get cancer than non-smokers. This is true that smoking can cause cancers such as lung cancer, throat cancer and mouth cancer. Ninety-percent of lung cancer-cases are due to smoking.
If no one smoked, lung cancer would be a rare diagnosis – only 0.5 % of people who have never smoked develop lung cancer in their lifetime.
In a recent study, eighty-eight percent of people diagnosed with cancer in India were at one-time shisha smokers.  The risk for lung cancer is significantly increased with continuous use of shisha.  A recent study concluded that shisha is at least the same, if not worse for one’s health, cancer-wise, than cigarettes.  Professor Thomas Eissenberg of Virginia of Commonwealth University concluded through his studies on shisha that “every risk of cigarette smoking is also associated with water pipes.”
If one smokes, the risk of contracting mouth cancer is four times higher than a non-smoker. Cancer can start in many areas of the mouth; the most common are underneath the tongue and on the lips.

Emphysema

Emphysema is a progressive disease of the airways that is characterized by a gradual loss of lung function. This serious lung disease causes damage that cannot be cured or reversed although there are treatments that can lead to some improvement in lung function. The symptoms of emphysema are tightness of breath, weight loss, fatigue, difficulty of breathing and morning headache.
As a matter of fact, an American popular talk show host Johnny Carson died because of emphysema in January 2005.
Dr. Michael Busk, a pulmonologist at Indiana University School of Medicine says that if Johnny Carson saw him he would have to advice him to stop smoking and gave him some medicines, and he might still be alive today.
Each year, over 120,000 Americans die because of emphysema according to the American Lung Association. Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease is the fourth largest cause of mortality in the U.S.

Chronic Bronchitis

Chronic bronchitis is indicated as coughing with a lot of mucus that continues for at least three months. Smoking is the most common cause of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and is responsible for 80% of cases. It is estimated that 90% out of twenty smokers have some emphysema when the lungs are examined after death, whereas more than 90% of non-smokers have little or none.

Cardiovascular Disease

Cardiovascular disease is a serious threat to smokers notably for shisha smokers.  The carbon monoxide intake is dangerously high when smoking shisha because of the high effects of exposure to second-hand smoke.
Therefore, it makes sense to stay away from smoking shisha.  The risks outweigh the little that can be benefited from it.  Let us make the right choice and stay off smoking shisha for the sake of our health and the people around us.

Image by renjith krishnan (freedigitalphotos.net)