Cigarettes are beneficial or at least not harmful: asked whether cigarettes are beneficial he answered 'Yes, beneficial'; elsewhere he said smoking has nothing to do with atherosclerosis and is 'not harmful at all' organically.

Original statement

انها لا تهضم يعني انت فاهم هل هل السجاير مفيده؟ اه مفيده دغري كده على طول يعني انت فاهم اللحمه ما فيهاش مشكله على

verbatim according to source. Translation by the project; the Arabic wording is authoritative.

Translation

Cigarettes are beneficial or at least not harmful: asked whether cigarettes are beneficial he answered 'Yes, beneficial'; elsewhere he said smoking has nothing to do with atherosclerosis and is 'not harmful at all' organically.

Origin

Source status

Video transcript (own words)

Attribution

Elawady (machine transcript)

Video

Dr Diaa Al Awady د ضياء العوضي is live! الكورتيزون حياتك (Open source)

Published

17 October 2025

Timestamp

0:16:40 (location in the original video’s automatic YouTube caption track; confirms where the words occur, not who speaks)

Attribution uncertainty

Transcript is YouTube CC or machine-generated (no timestamps); wording may contain speech-recognition errors. Speaker attribution within live streams/podcasts is not marked in the transcript; the excerpt was judged to be Elawady's own speech from context. Recurrence = number of archive transcripts matching the keyword pattern ['السجاير|سجاير|التدخين|سيجاره', 'مفيد|مش مضر|ما بتضرش|مضره'] (approximate; includes re-uploads/clips; 28 distinct text passages).

Claimed mechanism

Not stated.

Claimed health effect

Not specified.

Population concerned

Smokers.

Geographic restriction by Elawady

none found; he does not limit this statement to a country or to a production system

Diverging source versions

Scientific assessment

False – The statement contradicts the robust evidence.

Certainty of evidence: high – Further research is very unlikely to change the assessment.

1. What was claimed?

Cigarettes are beneficial (answer to a viewer) or not harmful, and smoking has nothing to do with atherosclerosis.

2. What is demonstrably correct?

Nothing in this health statement is supported by the evidence reviewed.

3. What is wrong or exaggerated?

Smoking one cigarette per day was associated with a relative risk of coronary heart disease of 1.48 in men and 1.57 in women (up to 1.74 and 2.19 with full adjustment), about half the excess risk of 20 per day; the authors conclude that no safe level of smoking exists for cardiovascular disease (I-INTB-21). In 50 years of follow-up of British doctors, continuing smokers died about 10 years earlier; stopping at 30 avoided almost all of the excess risk (I-CAN-01). Smoking accounts for 28.5% of US cancer deaths (I-CAN-02).

4. What remains unclear?

Whether the brief 'yes, beneficial' was meant ironically cannot be determined from the transcript; the other passage is unambiguous.

5. Which studies support it?

none

6. Which studies contradict it?

I-INTB-21, I-CAN-01, I-CAN-02, I-CAN-03.

7. What applies to Germany and Europe?

Smoking is the leading preventable cause of death in Europe (general knowledge).

8. What is known about Egypt?

Same evidence applies to Egypt; shisha and cigarettes both deliver tobacco smoke (general knowledge).

9. What practical conclusion is appropriate?

Stopping smoking at any age reduces risk; support to quit is available from physicians and pharmacists.

Assessment details

Rationale for certainty of evidence

Prospective evidence from 141 cohorts shows that even one cigarette per day markedly increases coronary heart disease and stroke risk (I-INTB-21); continuing smokers died about 10 years earlier than non-smokers (I-CAN-01); smoking is the leading risk factor for cancer deaths (I-CAN-02, I-CAN-03).

Source quality

Machine transcript of a live stream; wording may contain recognition errors; meaning checked in context. The 'yes, beneficial' answer came in a rapid question-and-answer sequence; the other passage (DMH-FBqMz0E) states clearly that cigarettes are not harmful. Related cancer statement: C-CAN-02.

Regional transferability

Universal; smoking prevalence among Egyptian men is high (general knowledge; not sourced here).

Individual exceptions

None; no safe level of smoking was identified for cardiovascular disease (I-INTB-21).

Regional scope of the claim

general (biological/medical)

Last reviewed

25 October 2026 provisional

In plain language

Dr. Elawady said cigarettes are beneficial or not harmful and have nothing to do with hardened arteries. This is wrong. Very large studies show that even one cigarette a day raises the risk of heart disease and stroke considerably. Long-term smokers die about ten years earlier on average. Quitting at any age helps, and quitting early removes most of the extra risk.

Studies on this claim

Regional context

Germany / EU

Smoking is the leading preventable cause of death in Europe (general knowledge).

Egypt

Same evidence applies to Egypt; shisha and cigarettes both deliver tobacco smoke (general knowledge).

• Drinking water quality

What applies in my country?

General scientific assessment

False Smoking is harmful at any level; it causes heart disease, stroke and cancer.

This statement concerns biological or medical relationships. The scientific assessment above applies regardless of the country; country-specific food data do not change it.

References

1. Low cigarette consumption and risk of coronary heart disease and stroke: meta-analysis of 141 cohort studies in 55 study reports.. Hackshaw A et al.. BMJ 2018 · PMID 29367388 · DOI 10.1136/bmj.j5855
2. Mortality in relation to smoking: 50 years' observations on male British doctors.. Doll R et al.. BMJ 2004 · PMID 15213107 · DOI 10.1136/bmj.38142.554479.AE
3. Proportion and number of cancer cases and deaths attributable to potentially modifiable risk factors in the United States, 2019.. Islami F et al.. CA Cancer J Clin 2024 · PMID 38990124 · DOI 10.3322/caac.21858
4. The global burden of cancer attributable to risk factors, 2010-19: a systematic analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2019.. GBD 2019 Cancer Risk Factors Collaborators. Lancet 2022 · PMID 35988567 · DOI 10.1016/S0140-6736(22)01438-6