Adolescents water-pipe smoking in Lebanon
It is an unfortunate reality nowadays that a terrifyingly great number of adolescents in Lebanon are either water pipe smokers themselves or are badly affected and influenced by secondhand smokers. Despite being fully aware of the harmful effects of smoking, some teenagers keep on consuming nicotine aiming to be portrayed as cool, sexy, and mature (Nakkash,2017). Furthermore, one tends to see young people water pipe smoking rather than smoking cigarettes since it is more socially accepted in the Lebanese society. However, people do not seem to be fully aware of its harmful affect. The consumption of an hour-long water pipe session is equivalent to smoking between five to ten packs per day. In an interview with the owner of “Prego” cafe , which is located next to the campus of the Lebanese American University, Ali Howeji stressed on the huge amount of teenagers that visit his cafe on daily bases. In addition, those adolescents tend to spend hours smoking shisha.” Teenagers tend to change two to three tobacco heads per day” howeiji explained. The later also emphasized how the majority of his customers are teenagers in which they smoke to look mature and cool, not knowing the damage they are causing to themselves. Thus, more awareness should be raised among children and parents when it comes to smoking, in order to reduce the great amount of smoking teenagers.