Quite the contrary, despite what many may think. According to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), water pipes of Persian origin, used mainly to smoke tobacco flavored with apple, mint, cherries, chocolate, coconut or melon, pose more risks than conventional cigarettes.
First, because the coal they use generates carbon monoxide, heavy metals and chemicals that increase the chances of developing tumors. The fact that tobacco passes through water does not detract from its toxicity either; rather, it increases it, since it adds harmful substances. In addition, the juices of exotic hookah tobaccos irritate the mouth , with the corresponding danger of oral cancer.
To this is added that, since these water pipes are usually enjoyed in groups, users are exposed to tobacco for longer. A one-hour session involves two hundred puffs per person , while a cigarette takes about twenty puffs. And if that were not enough, with the shisha or hookah each person inhales 90,000 milliliters of smoke, compared to the 500-600 that are inhaled when smoking a single cigarette, as read recently in a study published in the American Journal of Health Behavior .
Another recent work, carried out by scientists at Cornell University, has put figures on this different exposure to harmful compounds: in a hookah session, we absorb between two and four times more nicotine , up to 11 times more carbon monoxide, 100 times more tar , 17 times more formaldehyde, 2 to 5 times more polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons and three times more phenol than if we swallow the smoke from a conventional cigarette.
