Diving dangers for smokers

[Centrals]

Most of the tec divers that I met are NON smokers as compare with rec divers. But then I met a lot more rec divers than tec divers so I cannot really say that tec divers are more health conscientious than the rest.
My observation is probably statistically unproven.
I was grasping for breath on high altitude trekking in Nepal and Pakistan and it was really demoralizing when the Balti porter/Shepar loaded with >30kg pack casually lit up beside me.

 

[gobey]

I am regular pipe smoker and tec diver as well. There is some risk but friend of mine died in small airplane. You never know ... Life is hard

 

[brnt999]

Its a proven fact that smoking is bad for you.

Its theory that divers who smoke are more probable to die while diving than non-smokers.

 

[daniel1948]

[...] here in South-East Asia, smoking and diving seems to go hand in hand. It's more likely than not that your instructor or divemaster smokes. Hasn't seemed to have harmed most of them. [...]

I gather that in South-east Asia smoking is hugely common. So it's not specific to the dive industry. As for the comment "Hasn't seemed to have harmed most of them," there are several fallacies there:

1. You probably have not researched how many former DMs and instructors have had to quit diving because of smoking or who have died from smoking-related illness. You only encounter the ones who are still in the profession.

2. You probably have not seen X-rays of their lungs to judge how much damage they've done to themselves.

3. Professionals in active and athletic fields are generally in much better shape than the general public. A young smoking athlete will appear stronger than a middle-aged non-smoking couch potato who dives once in a while. It takes some years for smoking to really catch up with you.

I would suggest that indeed it is harming them, and that if you returned in ten years and looked up the same DMs and instructors you'd get a very different sense of their health.

I am a supporter of the idea that people who choose to poison themselves have a right to do so as long as they do not poison others at the same time (second-hand smoke). But I am also a very strong proponent of imprisonment for anyone who for profit lures unsuspecting or ignorant and immature young people into addiction at an age where they are ill-equipped to make rational decisions on the matter. Tobacco companies are criminal enterprises, just one more group of drug cartels, and as ruthless as the ones that operate outside the law.

 

[Skittl1321]

The medical form instructions recommend that the diver have an exercise capacity of 13 METS (among other things)

I can pretty much guarantee that 80% of actual (not internet) vacation divers are not capable of sustaining 13 METs for the length of a dive. It's roughly equivalent to:

• Hiking up a 5% incline at 6 MPH wearing a 44 pound backpack.
• Ice Hockey
• Running a marathon

This is a much higher standard than actual SCUBA diving requires, however it's printed right on the form.

The PADI form I'm looking at says "Inability to perform moderate exercise (example: walk 1.6 km/one mile within 12 minutes)". A 12 minute mile is extremely different from the examples you've given. (Though I'd argue it is nearly impossible to WALK a 12 minute mile, at least some of that would need to be a light jog.)

I am not a doctor, but nothing about the way the 13 METS (minimum) stress testing is listed suggests a diver should be able to sustain that for a length of a dive. And if that is the minimum exercise level that every diver should reach, and not just those with Cardiovascular risk factors, then PADI is doing a pretty awful job of screening with their form; because a 12-minute mile is nowhere near 13 METs.

Since people are talking about depth limits- I had a hyperbaric physician suggest one to me (for a totally different condition, I don't smoke- so maybe it makes sense in this case, but not for smokers), but that isn't the doctor who signs my forms (he does not do physicals). Having talked with some other divers/doctors, it seems the depth limit is a best guest to limit risk. I'd probably be fine below it, but since this guy would be the one who is treating me, I stick with it.

 

[daniel1948]

Lately I've been jogging 12.5-minute miles. Definitely a jog for me, though good race-walkers can walk faster than I jog. But I agree that for most people, 12-minute miles is definitely a jog, not a walk. I wonder if PADI pulled that number out of a dark place, or if that's a reasonable requirement for diving. I wonder what DAN says.

 

[Skittl1321]

I think completing a 12 minute mile is a reasonable requirement. But walking it is a bit bizarre.

 

[TMHeimer]

But I am also a very strong proponent of imprisonment for anyone who for profit lures unsuspecting or ignorant and immature young people into addiction at an age where they are ill-equipped to make rational decisions on the matter. Tobacco companies are criminal enterprises, just one more group of drug cartels, and as ruthless as the ones that operate outside the law.

***********************

I agree. But I don't know if there is any "luring" anymore. I know cigarette ads (or billboards at least) were banned in Canada about 35 years ago (I remember when it happened...). I spend about 5 months per year in the U.S. and don't recall seeing ads there either. Maybe it's an Asia thing?

 

[daniel1948]

Advertising as such is a thing of the past here, but they spend a lot of money in nefarious ways to get kids to smoke. In North America smoking is a lot less socially acceptable than it was and there's a lot more public awareness about the health effects. But the tobacco companies are global and they know very well that in the long term they need to lure kids into smoking if they are to be profitable in the long term. They've always denied that their ads are aimed at kids, but kids have always been their real targets.

Just as the cocaine cartels in Latin America target kids in North America, so the tobacco companies target kids overseas. Both are peddling death and destruction to people who lack the discernment to make a well-informed choice, and both are nothing less than mass murderers with the blood of millions of innocents on their hands.

There is no rational reason why smoking in the same room with kids is not regarded as child abuse and treated as such. (Yes, I get emotional over this issue because my father and step-mother smoked around me, making me constantly sick to my stomach, and then scolded me for being rude if I tried to wave the smoke away from my face. Fortunately I was only there alternate weekends.) Eventually my step-mother came down with emphysema. Emphysema does not kill you. It just makes you wish you were dead. I hated my step-mother, but even I didn't want her to suffer that much. What she did to herself by smoking was far worse than what she did to me, and far, far worse than anything I'd ever have wanted to do to her for all her abuse of me. People who die of lung cancer from smoking are the lucky ones. Emphysema is like being strangled, constantly, 24/7, for years, even decades.

 

[TMHeimer]

daniel1948, Once again, I agree with all. I am curious, as I really don't know--- What exactly do the cocaine cartels in Latin America and tobacco companies overseas do to attract kids? Which countries? Do they really have cocaine ads in Latin America?