Diving into the Pool in Exchange for Delivering Hookahs to the Municipality

Mohammad Mofagh, the cultural and social deputy of the Bojnourd municipality, announced the city's decision to reduce hookah consumption. In an interview with Tasnim, he stated: "Citizens can receive 10 pool tickets by delivering hookahs at the City Culture House and the security of the Workers' Sports Complex." He also added: "The collected hookahs will be transformed into pots at an appropriate time and displayed in a park or a designated location." Currently, according to Gharibpour, a health official in Hormozgan province, the age of hookah consumption in Iran has reached 15 years. Additionally, Abolfazl Riazi, the student deputy of the Student Affairs Organization, mentioned in June that 7% of Iranian students consume hookah and 15% smoke cigarettes. Mojtaba Khosrotaj, the Deputy Minister of Industry, Mine, and Trade for Trade, announced at the World No Tobacco Day conference that the annual cigarette consumption in the country is between 55 to 65 billion cigarettes. The consumption of hookah and its provision in coffee houses and other businesses across various regions of Iran has experienced many ups and downs in recent years. In June of this year, the head of the Health and Work Environment Department of the Ministry of Health mentioned the closure of 100 unauthorized tobacco-selling centers in the past week, stating to Fars News Agency: "From the beginning of October this year, the prohibition of flavored and aromatic tobacco will be enforced by mandating the Ministry of Industries." Currently, according to Ali Ata Taheri, the executive director of the Tobacco Control Society, the provision of hookah in public places, including coffee houses, is illegal based on a directive issued by the Ministry of Industry, Mine, and Trade. According to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the former commander of the police force, multiple and sometimes contradictory decisions have been made regarding the prohibition or non-prohibition of hookah during Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's presidency. He revealed in a television program in October 2013 the efforts of the then Minister of Health, Kamran Lankarani, in a late-night cabinet meeting to prohibit hookah consumption in coffee houses. Ahmadinejad also mentioned that in that meeting, "it was initially decided that in coffee houses that only serve tea and hookah, instead of hookah, they would serve stews and food, but by the time we were about to implement this plan, we backed down under pressure from Ahmadinejad's union." In recent years, there have been many discussions and debates between health officials in Iran and the officials of the coffee house unions regarding the prohibition or legality of providing hookah in public places. In this context, "30,000 people" will be unemployed due to the closure of traditional tea houses in Karaj. The police have closed 29 restaurants and confiscated over a thousand vehicles in Karaj over the past year. The police installed surveillance cameras in coffee houses in western Tehran.