By CAM LUCADOU-WELLS
GREATER Dandenong Council is seeking to form a coalition with medical bodies and other councils to ban indoor shisha smoking in cafes and restaurants.
Shisha cafes, which are proliferating in Dandenong and Noble Park, have an exemption under the state Tobacco Act to host unrestricted indoor smoking out of a hookah.
Under the loophole, children under 18 are permitted to smoke shisha.
In contrast, cigarettes and other tobacco products are banned from minors and inside cafes and restaurants.
The motion’s proponent, councillor Matthew Kirwan, said the move was partly prompted by a Medical Journal of Australia case study of a young woman – and regular shisha smoker – being rushed to hospital with carbon monoxide poisoning.
His motion attacked the “misconception” that shisha smoke was less harmful than cigarettes.
“We’re a community affected by the lack of regulation of shisha,” Cr Kirwan told a council meeting last Monday.
He noted Victoria is the only Australian state that has a shisha exemption.
The council will write to health bodies the Lebanese Medical Association, the Heart Foundation, Cancer Council of Victoria, Quit Victoria and the state branch of the Australian Medical Association, which have publicly opposed the exemption.
The council will also invite the Municipal Association of Victoria and Victorian Local Governance Association to join the joint campaign directed at the state government.
Shisha cafe owners defend the practice of serving “herbal” shisha, which contains minute quantities of tobacco.
Proprietor Maruf Ahmed told the Journal in 2013 that his fruit-flavoured shisha was not as unhealthy as tobacco-heavy shisha smoked in the Middle East.
Quit Victoria policy manager Kylie Lindorff told the Journal in 2013 that shisha and hookah tobacco posed substantial health risks to both the user and those exposed to second-hand smoke.
“Waterpipe smoking is not a safe alternative to cigarette smoking.
“It produces a similar level of air pollutants as cigarettes so staff working in these shisha cafes are not afforded the same protection as those working in other cafes and indoor areas.”
The government’s reported position prior to the state election was that banning shisha “particularly when it has no tobacco content, could unfairly affect parts of our multicultural community“.
