Hookah vs tobacco cigarettes? What's the real story

As we all know, smoking or using spit tobacco has many harmful side effects and negative health consequences. Smoking tobacco is the leading cause of PREVENTABLE deaths in the United States. One of the major culprits for the continued use is nicotine. Nicotine is a very power psychoactive drug, meaning that once nicotine enters the brain, it triggers many of our chemical messenger to be released and causes our body to be in a state of fight-or-flight. The dependence for this nasty substance will creep up on a person. If they don't smoke, there will be withdrawal symptoms occurring. Here are just a few statistics about smoking:

* about 71 million people smoke
* although it's illegal to sell cigarettes to a minor, about 500 million packs are consumed by minors each year

With so much information about smoking health risks, it's a wonder why people still smoke. There are so many smoke-cessation groups and programs that can effectively help people kick the nicotine habit.


One major controversy that I have come across in my life is whether smoking hookah is different than smoking cigarettes. I know many people who smoke hookah but they would never smoke a cigarette! Why is that? Unsure...

Hookah is basically a waterpipe which is used to smoke tobacco, in which the smoke is cooled and filtered by passing through water. This activity originates from India and is gaining much popularity in the US. I, myself, did not know what hookah was or what the health implications were of smoking it but all i did know, was that smoking tobacco is smoking tobacco... who cares if its in a cigarette form or a hookah waterpipe. I would never touch the stuff. So this is mainly for those who don't know the health implications of smoking hookah.

Smoking hookah has shown the same health effects as if smoking cigarettes... bad ones!
- the tobacco is not less toxic in hookah than with cigarettes
- the filtering of the smoke does not remove the toxic ingredients
- hookah smoke contains the same nasty chemicals as cigarettes; hookah smokers are exposed to more carbon monoxide than cigarette smokers!
- you receive the same amount of nicotine from hookah as you would from a cigarette.
- the harms from secondhand smoke is the same for both

Here's the even worse information:
- Normally, each hookah session lasts about 45 minutes; within that time, you are consuming 100-200 times the smoke of a single cigarette. Think of the increased amount of nicotine and carbon monoxide you will be inhaling just from one round of hookah!
- Hookah smokers are at risk for the same kinds of diseases as cigarette smokers: including oral, lung,and stomach cancers
- lastly, if you are sharing the pipe with other people,the risk of transmission of diseases such as herpes or hepatitis or other illness will increase

To conclude, I am exposing the truth about Hookah to all the people out there who do not know the risks that are involved in this social activity. Please think the next time that your friends want to go out to the Hookah bar... do you really want to be exposing yourself to these harmful substances? If you don't like cigarette smoking, hookah is not any better!

Gummy Vitamins are tasty but they are lacking essential nutrients... beware!

For a while now there has been a lot of hype with the new gummy vitamins that are available for adults. I know that they are tasty and people think its fun, but I would really be cautious with taking them.

Here I will compare Women's Daily Multivitamin (Up&Up brand) and Rhino Gummy Bear Vitamins. Both can be purchased at Target so if you want to compare them yourselves, please do so.

Women's Daily   Rhino Gummy   Amt.  %DV   Amt %DV Vit A 2500 IU 50%   2500 IU 50% Vit C 60 mg 100%   18 mg 30% Vit D 800 IU 200%   60 IU 15% Vit E 30 IU 100%   15 IU 50% Vit K 25 mcg 31%   none   Vit B1 Thiamin 1.5 mg 100%   none   Vit B2 Riboflavin 1.7 mg 100%   none   Niacin 10 mg 50%   none   Vit B6 2 mg 100%   0.7 mg 35% Folic Acid 400 mcg 100%   240 mcg 60% Vit B12 6 mcg 100%   4 mcg 67% Biotin 30 mcg 10%   60 mcg 20% Pantothenic acid 5 mg 50%   5 mg 50% Calcium 450 mg 45%   none   Iron 18 mg 100%   none   Magnesium 50 mg 13%   none   Zinc 15 mg 100%   2.2 mg 15% Selenium 20 mcg 29%   none   Copper 2 mg 100%   none   Manganese 2 mg 100%   none   Chromium 120 mcg 100%   none

When you look at these values, you can obviously see how they are different. I have highlighted a few that are key differences that are very important vitamins and minerals to our health.

Vitamin C: everyone knows that this is important to our immunity.

Vitamin D: there has been a lot of controversy in the daily recommended amount of this. But the daily amount has recently been increased so the low amounts will have to be supplemented.

Folic Acid: this especially crucial during fetus development, so please do not take gummys when you are pregnant!

Calcium: again, another type of supplement will need to be taken, or increase your milk intake.

Iron: if you have every suffered from iron-deficiency anemia please do not take the gummy vitamins, unless there is other supplementation.

In conclusion, please be careful when you take the gummy vitamins. Always look on the back of the label to make sure you are getting all the recommended amounts of each vitamin and mineral. All of these values are carefully examined and are put in place for a reason. All the recommended values are based on scientific research, in which it has to be completely proven to be implemented.

If you have any questions about vitamins and minerals and what you need, please let me know. I am always here for your nutrition and fitness questions.