WHO TobReg (Study Group for Tobacco product REGulation): More Democratic than the UN Insecurity Council...

In the US News and World Report dated Jan 2, 2008, not less than 4 waterpipe™ experts (representing the anti-tobacco "waterpipe"™ fear mongering Goliath) are interviewed:

1) Danny McGOLDRICK, vice president for research at the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids.
2) Norman EDELMAN, chief medical officer of the American Lung Association, author, author of this: An Emerging Deadly Trend : Waterpipe Tobacco Use…
3) Samira ASMA, an epidemiologist at the CDC, great expert in this field who discovered only recently that "hookahs are lit with a piece of charcoal"... (Read: US Public Health Organizations Myths about Hookah Smoking (Lung Cancer, etc.) Debunked )

4) Thomas EISSENBERG, of the US-Syrian Center for Tobacco Studies (2 million dollar funding renewed for 5 other years), tirelessly parroting, for 3 years now, that "a single hookah session contains approximately 36 times the tar, 1.7 times the nicotine, and 8.3 times the carbon monoxide as the smoke produced by one cigarette". Of course, each of these figures is completely wrong.

AGAINST David’s public health isolated though devastating voice (KC's)…

Very democratic, no ?

>> CHECK OUT NOW BY YOURSELF: The Rising Allure—and Danger—of Hookah

In another paper of the US News and World Report: Hookah Smoking as Tough on Lungs as Cigarettes (Jan 3, 2008), the topic is a biased “new study” by S. Katharine HAMMOND, "chairwoman of the division of environmental health sciences at the University of California, Berkeley”. Further to our critiques, its author acknowledges that hookahs "may not give you lung cancer but may compromise your health in other ways"….

Now, S.K HAMMOND is above all a member of WHO TobReg, the "Study Group for Tobacco product REGulation" of the WHO (World Health Organization). This group stands behind the Erroneous WHO 1st Expert Report on "Waterpipe"™ , further laundered and recycled by the joint US-Syrian Center for Tobacco Studies in the Erroneous and Unethical Cochrane Review .

Notably, the latter was “peer-reviewed” by Mirjana DJORDJEVIC, also a member of WHO TobReg and Alan SHIHADEH, the co-author of the first WHO erroneous expert… Very democratic, no ?

This isn't all. WHO TobReg is also responsible for: Serious Errors in World Health Organization New Report on “Scientific Basis of Tobacco Product Regulation” (in which, among other very serious errors regarding "waterpipe™", SNUS, the Swedish smokeless tobacco which has succeeded in cutting down the prevalence of lung cancer, chronic bronchitis, arteritis and infarction by almost 100%, is said to be "deadly" !)

Finally, please note the striking hegemony of US Anti-Tobacco Fear mongers within WHO TobReg:

Erik DYBING (Norway; Chairman)

David L. ASHLEY (USA)
David BURNS (USA)
Mirjana DJORDJEVIC (USA)
S.Katharine HAMMOND (USA)
Jack HENNINGFIELD (USA)
Channing ROBERTSON (USA)

N. GRAY (Australia)
Martin JARVIS (United Kindom)
Ghazi ZAATARI (Lebanon, US-American University of Beirut)
K. Srinath REDDY (India)

Therefore, 6 out 11 WHO TobReg members are based in the USA (many in California, a place now well known for its very permissive laws and human tolerance)(*). Note that the Lebanese member is from the US-American University of Beirut (not the Arab University of Beirut…).

(*) >> WIRE from California (Dec 28, 2007): In conformity with a city ordinance, all apartments in Belmont are now considered "smoke-free" places. STOP. Only owners of private houses can smoke at home. STOP

CONCLUSION: this distribution is scientifically democratic, isn’t it ? Yes, even more democratic than the United Nations Insecurity Council...

Image: courtesy of Haut et Fort

YOU ARE NOT ON THE HOME PAGE of the OBSERVATORY on HOOKAH and HEALTH (Narghile, "Waterpipe"™, Health, Risks, Dangers, Diseases, Tar, Nicotine, Cancer). CLICK HERE to go there !