Some people believe vaping is completely safe, shisha is healthier than cigarettes, or smoking isn’t that bad if you don’t do it often. Before you buy into these myths, let’s break down the actual dangers of each one—and how they can affect your health.
The Risks of Smoking
We all know smoking is bad for you, but it’s important to understand why it’s so harmful. Cigarettes contain thousands of chemicals, many of which are toxic and cause serious health problems. Here’s what smoking can do to your body:
- Lung Damage: Cigarette smoke irritates and damages your lungs, leading to breathing problems like chronic bronchitis and emphysema. Over time, your lungs become less effective at getting oxygen into your blood, making it harder to breathe normally.
- Cancer: Smoking is the leading cause of lung cancer, but it’s not just your lungs at risk. Smoking can also cause cancer in your mouth, throat, and even your bladder. This happens because cigarettes contain carcinogens—chemicals that can trigger cancer.
- Heart Problems: The chemicals in cigarette smoke damage your heart and blood vessels, increasing your risk of heart disease and strokes. Over time, smoking causes your arteries to narrow, which can lead to heart attacks.
- Nicotine Addiction: Cigarettes contain nicotine, which is highly addictive. Once you start, it’s hard to stop. Nicotine makes your brain crave more cigarettes, creating a cycle that keeps you smoking even when you want to quit.
It’s easy to fall into the trap of thinking, “I only smoke when I go out” or “It’s not a big deal if I don’t do it every day.” But smoking—whether it’s occasional or regular—still puts you at risk for serious health issues. Even social smoking can lead to addiction, making it harder to quit later.
The Risks of Vaping
Vaping has become really popular, especially among younger people. Many see it as a “healthier” alternative to smoking, or a trendy way to try nicotine without lighting up a cigarette. But while vaping might be less harmful than smoking, it’s not without risks. Here’s what you should know:
- Nicotine Addiction: A lot of people don’t realise that most vapes still contain nicotine, the same addictive chemical found in cigarettes. And because some vapes come in sweet, fruity flavours, it’s easy to forget you’re still getting hooked on nicotine. Addiction can happen quickly, especially with high-nicotine vapes.
- Lung Damage: Vaping might not involve the harmful tar and carbon monoxide found in cigarettes, but it still exposes your lungs to chemicals that can cause damage. Some people have even developed serious lung conditions linked to vaping, like EVALI (e-cigarette or vaping-associated lung injury), which led to hospitalisation for some vapers.
- Unknown Long-Term Effects: Vaping hasn’t been around as long as smoking, so we don’t yet know all the long-term health effects. But early studies suggest it could have negative impacts on lung and heart health over time. You’re still inhaling chemicals into your lungs, and we just don’t know yet how this will affect your health in the future.
- Misinformation: One of the biggest problems with vaping is the misinformation surrounding it. Many people think vaping is totally harmless or that it’s just “water vapour,” but that’s not true. While vaping is less harmful than smoking cigarettes, it’s still risky, especially if you use unregulated products or black-market vapes, which could contain harmful substances.
It’s also important to know that while vaping might help some adult smokers quit smoking, it’s not meant for people who’ve never smoked. If you start vaping without ever smoking cigarettes, you’re essentially getting addicted to nicotine for no reason.
The Risks of Shisha (Hookah)
Shisha, also known as hookah, is often seen as a fun, social way to smoke tobacco, especially in Middle Eastern and South Asian cultures. You might head to a shisha bar with friends, sit around sharing a hookah, and think it’s a safer option than smoking. But here’s the truth:
- Misconceptions About Safety: A lot of people think that because the smoke passes through water, it’s somehow “cleaned” and less harmful. But research shows this isn’t the case. The water doesn’t filter out the toxic chemicals found in tobacco. A single shisha session can expose you to the same amount of smoke as smoking 10–20 cigarettes.
- Toxic Chemicals: Shisha smoke contains nicotine, carbon monoxide, tar, and heavy metals, just like cigarette smoke. Because a shisha session can last for an hour or more, you end up inhaling a lot of these harmful substances. Long-term shisha use increases the risk of heart disease, lung disease, and cancer.
- Second-Hand Smoke: If you’re in a shisha bar, even if you’re not smoking, you’re still breathing in second-hand smoke. This exposes you to the same harmful chemicals as the people actively using the hookah. Being in an enclosed space, like a shisha bar, makes this even worse.
- Sharing Risks: Shisha is often smoked socially, with people sharing the same mouthpiece. If the mouthpiece isn’t properly cleaned, there’s a risk of passing on infections like herpes, hepatitis, or even tuberculosis.
While shisha is deeply rooted in many cultures and can be an important part of social gatherings, it’s important to recognise that it carries serious health risks. There’s a myth that shisha is somehow safer than smoking cigarettes, but the reality is that it can be just as harmful—if not more—because of the extended time people spend smoking during a session.
Don’t Fall for the Myths
Whether it’s vaping, smoking, or shisha, the key takeaway is that none of these options are risk-free. While vaping might be less harmful than smoking, it’s not harmless—especially when it comes to addiction and lung health. Shisha might seem like a fun, social activity, but it exposes you to harmful chemicals in a similar way to cigarettes.
The best way to protect your health is to avoid smoking and vaping altogether, or quit if you’ve already started. If you’re looking for ways to manage stress or fit in socially, there are healthier options that won’t put your lungs or heart at risk.
At the end of the day, the choice is yours—but it’s important to make informed decisions. Don’t let misinformation or social pressure convince you that these habits are harmless. Understanding the real risks can help you make better choices for your health, both now and in the future.
Where to find support
If you’re ready to quit or just thinking about it and looking for more information, there are many places you can turn to.
- Quit Your Way Scotland – this is a support service for anyone in Scotland of any age, run by NHS 24. You can phone a trained advisor on 0800 84 84 84 (Mon-Fri 9am-5pm) or visit the NHS Inform website for more information
- Make an appointment with your GP