Waterpipegate and Climategate : Man Made Hookah (Shisha, Narghile, ""Waterpipe"") Side-Stream Smoke and Climate Change

First 150 words (foreword) tapped from the Knol Hotline

“This is a critique of Nancy Daher et al (US-American University of Beirut)’s unethical and highly politicised paper on ““waterpipe”” side-stream smoke, based on the smoking machine operated by Alan Shihadeh (id.)[1] . The right place to discuss a controversial paper containing serious errors and biases is the journal in which it was published. Unfortunately, for political (and not scientific) reasons, this is not always possible. On the very reasons for which this was not permitted, please contact us.

Interestingly, the Atmospheric Environment journal is hosted by the University of East Anglia (School of Environmental Sciences). It is noteworthy that the Climate Research Unit of this institution was recently hacked by individuals who succeeded in revealing how dissenting views are silenced and blocked [2].

“Waterpipegate” refers to one of the other numerous ethical scientific scandals involving the World Health Organisation [3-6] [...]”

Cited References:

[1] Nancy Daher N, Saleh R, Jaroudi E, Sheheitli H, Badr T, Sepetdjian E, Al-Rashidi M, Saliba N, Shihadeh A. Comparison of carcinogen, carbon monoxide, and ultrafine particle emissions from narghile waterpipe and cigarette smoking: Sidestream smoke measurements and assessment of second-hand smoke emission factors. Atmospheric Environment 2010; 44(1): 8-14.

[2] Peter Kelemen (Columbia University's Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences). What East Anglia's e-mails really tell us about climate change. Popular Mechanics 2009 (1 Dec). "If scientists attempted to exclude critics' peer-reviewed papers from IPCC reports, this was unethical in my view."

[3] Chaouachi K. A Critique of the WHO's TobReg "Advisory Note" entitled: "Waterpipe Tobacco Smoking: Health Effects, Research Needs and Recommended Actions by Regulators. Journal of Negative Results in Biomedicine 2006 (17 Nov); 5:17. Doi:10.1186/1477-5751-5-17

[4] Oxman AD, Lavis JN, Fretheim A. Use of evidence in WHO recommendations . Lancet. 2007 Jun 2;369(9576):1883-9.

[5] F. William Engdahl. WHO ‘Swine Flu Pope’ under investigation for gross conflict of interest. Voltaire Non Aligned Press Network 2010 (22 Jan)

[6] Girard M. World Health Organization Vaccine Recommendations: Scientific Flaws, or Criminal Misconduct? Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons 2006;11(1):22-3.

Image: Courtesy of Florence Cestac, Metro, 24 Jan 2008


RELEVANT READINGS

Alan Shihadeh, Findings on waterpipe second hand smoke: E-Letter to the BMJ (Oct 20, 2009)


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