Hookah promotion on social media platforms can pose health challenges, study finds



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Posts with hashtags, such as #hookah or #shisha, on social media platforms, can portray its use in an extremely positive way despite its serious health risks, suggests a new study.

The findings, published in the journal Health Education and Behavior, suggested that the representation and promotion of hookah on social media can standardize its use and pose public health problems.

A team of researchers from Florida International University, the University of Wisconsin, the University of Miami, The Syrian Center for Tobacco Studies and the University of Pittsburgh have selected 279 positions out of 11,517 positions tagged hookah or shisha over a period of four days

They found that 99.6% expressed positive feelings towards the hookah. cent) mentioned its adverse effects on health.

"More and more evidence suggests that hookah smoking can lead to nicotine addiction and many other smoking-related illnesses." This study represents an important step in identifying topics related to narghile smoking. Instagram and demonstrates the value of using data from this social platform to supplement and expand The researchers also found that 10% of all posts were using the #HookahAddiction hashtag, signaling that nicotine addiction n & # It is not perceived as a health risk that would discourage potential users ironically or as "badge of honor".

Researchers commented that policymakers and others should explore approaches to reducing the number of promotional positions, for example, by creating campaigns to counter positive themes on social media. 19659002] "These results can inform the design of future media campaigns against smoking to counter the normalization of the use of narghile on the media," note the researchers

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