NICE formal approval given to anti-craving drug for smokers
OnMedica Reporters (Wednesday, 25 July 2007)
The National Institute of Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) has today formally approved the use of the anti-smoking drug varenicline (Champix) and issued trusts with guidance.
The move comes less than a month after England went smoke-free.
Varenicline works by curbing nicotine cravings and withdrawal symptoms, and it is thought that this may more effectively help would-be quitters kick the habit. Currently around 70% of smokers relapse under the strain of trying to give up.
And although more expensive than other available treatment options, it could be cheaper to prescribe in the long run, if fewer quit attempts are needed.
The NICE guidance recommends that the drug should normally be prescribed as part of a programme of behavioural support, but that this should not deter practitioners from using the treatment if no such support is available.
Around 25% of the UK population still smoke, resulting in more than 100,000 tobacco related deaths every year and the government has pledged to cut the proportion of adult smokers to 21% by 2010.
But Professor Robert West, director of tobacco control studies at Cancer Research UK, was reported in Independent Nurse a few weeks ago as saying that he thought that the government needed a whole raft of policy initiatives, including further price rises, if it was to meet its target.
The BMA has also called for tobacco sales to be banned in the under 18s, where take-up of smoking is highest, and the discontinuation of packets of 10 cigarettes, which are bought disproportionately more often by children.
NICE will be publishing further guidance on the effectiveness of smoking cessation treatments in hard to reach groups later this year.
