Heavily addicted smokers do not get enough support to help them quit, warns a UK report published last week. It calls for better access to nicotine replacement treatment as part of a harm reduction strategy.

It proposes that a new nicotine regulatory authority be established to oversee all aspects of regulation of nicotine products and to coordinate efforts to end the advantage that cigarettes currently have in the marketplace over alternative products such as gums and patches.

The report, published by the Royal College of Physicians, argues that smokers smoke mainly for the effects of nicotine, that nicotine itself is not especially hazardous, and that providing nicotine in an acceptable and effective form such as cigarette substitutes could save millions of …