Doing it wrong – Smoking and diving

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Doing it Wrong-Smoking and Diving, H. Hamza

One of the many specificities of Global Underwater Explorers as a community and a training agency is the strict anti-smoking stance. Not only are instructors required to be non-smokers – students are too, and any diver wishing to pursue GUE dive training is made aware of that.

While most committed divers understand the fact that diving is a sport, and therefore a certain level of fitness is required in order to safely be a member of a diving team, there is sometimes a misunderstanding as to why smoking should be a big no-go among divers. After all, there are numerous divers who also smoke, aren’t there?

There is more to it than just common sense: smoking is bad for health, and everybody knows that. But what, specifically, makes a smoker non-fit for being part of a team of divers seriously working on committed dives?

Heather Hamza, CRNA, M.S., takes our understanding to the next level, following the “evidence-based practice” approach that has been one of the trademark of GUE since the beginning: her fantastic article will take you through the scientific rationales of keeping diving a non-smoking sport.