Smoking tobacco through a water pipe is the new fashion for puffing-up in the United States but has long been a hazard to Syrian smokers.
Thursday at The University of Memphis Center for Community Health, a team of Syrian physicians, headed by Wasim Maziak, said although some people feel it is not harmful, smoking through a water pipe is just as dangerous as smoking cigarettes.
Kenneth Ward, assistant professor for CCH, received a $1.7 million research and training grant to establish the Syrian Center for Tobacco Studies, the only smoking research facility in Syria.
The grant, awarded by National Institutes of Health, will fund a joint effort by Ward and Maziak, SCTS director, to research tobacco use in Syria and help smokers kick the addiction in a country where nearly half the adult population smokes.
The NIH has handed out $20.5 million in an effort to combat the growth of tobacco-caused illnesses and deaths in the developing world.
“This is a chance for The University to get involved in international health research,” Ward said.
Smoking research in Syria is almost non-existent, unlike in the United States where many researchers stress prevention and quitting, Ward said.
U.S. researchers have done numerous studies that don’t seem to be effective in European countries, Maziak said. The focus of the STCS is to address a different culture.
In Syrian society, most people know the danger of smoking but find it hard to quit because it is an acceptable tradition, Maziak said.
“Most smokers are highly interested in quitting,” he said. “In one research, 60 percent said they wanted to quit.”
Maziak said almost 90 percent of smokers in developed countries become addicted by the age of 19.
“People start smoking as a social thing or because they want to be independent,” Ward said. “They think they can smoke a little a day or for just a year and they end up being addicted. Then they’re like, 30, and want to quit but they can’t.”
Several people use a water pipe, or narghile, because they think it is safer, Ward said. It is popular among Syrian women because it is more socially acceptable than cigarettes.
Smokers use water pipes because they feel smooth and don’t burn like cigarettes, Ward said. But the pipes, consisting of water, charcoal and tobacco, increase the carbon monoxide level in people higher than cigarettes.
“We have a problem with smoking in Syria and we haven’t done anything about it,” Maziak said.
According to another study, Syrian teachers spend 20 percent of their monthly income on cigarettes.
Ward said they are hoping after the research, Syrian physicians will be able to help patients quit smoking.
“Nicotine is very subtle,” he said. “It’s probably more addictive than crack-cocaine. Some people have said it is more easy to give up heroin than cigarettes.”
According to research conducted by the British Medical Association, nearly one-third of adults smoke worldwide and one in 10 die from smoking.
Last week, Ward gave a speech on the SCTS at the Fogarty International Center in New Orleans.
He will travel to Syria this summer to help present smoking research to the Aleppo School of Medicine.
“I’m very excited to be a part of a program that will help people quit smoking,” he said.
