Health department criticised over 'condescending' smoking ad
NSW Health is being criticised over an advertisement warning people over the dangers of smoking shisha.
The state government launched its Shisha No Thanks campaign recently “to raise awareness of the harms of waterpipe smoking in young people from Arabic speaking backgrounds, their family, friends and social networks across metropolitan Sydney”.
In the ad, a father asks at a barbecue whether it’s “time for shisha?”.
He tells his son, who is occupied kicking a soccer ball, and his daughter, who is on her phone, to fetch the hookah but both refuse. The man then asks his wife to bring the pipe out and she obliges.
But as the woman brings it to the guests, the ad changes to the perspective of the younger people. Instead of seeing the packed, flavoured tobacco on top of the hookah, the younger guests see dozens of cigarettes.
The dad then asks one younger guest if he’d like shisha to which he replies, “no thanks”.
The ad closes stating 45 minutes of smoking shisha is the equivalent to smoking 100 cigarettes.
It was shared by Western Sydney Health’s Facebook page on Saturday but has been flooded with criticism with some people calling the advertisement “rubbish”.
“The health department needs to stay out of this,” one man wrote.
“This isn’t about health. This isn’t about well-being. This is about hang outs. This is culture. This is life.”
Another called the ad, “bulls**t” and another “manipulating and condescending”.
“Wow, nice way to bash the culture. How about a stupid ad,” another man wrote.
Despite the claims of culture bashing, the ad was actually made with the assistance of the Lebanese Muslim Association (LMA) and NSW Multicultural Health Communication Service.
Cancer Institute NSW chief executive, Professor David Currow said it was important for people to understand smoking shisha is as dangerous to a person’s health as smoking cigarettes.
“A person who smokes shisha is at risk of the same health problems that a person who smokes cigarettes faces, including cancer and respiratory illness,” Prof Currow said.
Despite some on Facebook expressing doubts about the ad, health experts around the world warn about the adverse effects of smoking shisha.
According to Dr J. Taylor Hays, in an article for the Mayo Clinic in the US, hookah smoking isn’t safer than cigarettes.
“Hookah smokers may actually inhale more tobacco smoke than cigarette smokers do because of the large volume of smoke they inhale in one smoking session, which can last as long as 60 minutes,” Dr Hays wrote.
“Hookah smoke contains high levels of toxic compounds, including tar, carbon monoxide, heavy metals and cancer-causing chemicals (carcinogens). In fact, hookah smokers are exposed to more carbon monoxide and smoke than are cigarette smokers.”
Dr Hays added similarly to smoking cigarettes, hookah smoking “is linked to lung and oral cancers, heart disease, and other serious illnesses”.
The doctor’s claims are echoed by the British Heart Foundation.
“In one puff of shisha you inhale the same amount of smoke as you’d get from smoking a whole cigarette,” an article on its site reads.
“The average shisha-smoking session lasts an hour and research has shown that in this time you can inhale the same amount of smoke as from more than 100 cigarettes.”
However, not everyone on Facebook was critical of the ad.
“It's a sad state of affairs when the government has to create a campaign to teach muslims how to be healthier,” one woman wrote.
“Everyone who is defending their use of shisha has lost touch of reality. Your lungs are a priceless gift and this is how you choose to kill them.”
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