E-cigarettes may work as well as nicotine patches to help smokers quit.

NBC Nightly News reported that in a study published in the Lancet and presented at a meeting of the European Respiratory Society, researchers “found that E-cigarettes worked as well as nicotine patches in helping smokers kick the habit.”

        The AP (9/8, Cheng) reported that in a study published in the Lancet and presented at a meeting of the European Respiratory Society, researchers found that “electronic cigarettes worked just as well as nicotine patches to help smokers quit.” The study involved more than 650 smokers who wanted to stop smoking. Nearly 300 participants were given “nicotine-containing e-cigarettes while roughly the same number got nicotine patches.” Meanwhile, more than 70 participants were given “placebo e-cigarettes without any nicotine.” Participants used the products they were assigned for 13 weeks.

        The Huffington Post (9/8, Chan, 11.54M) reported that 7.3 percent of those given the e-cigarettes “abstained from smoking during that entire period,” while 5.8 percent of the participants given nicotine patches “had abstained.” Meanwhile, just four percent of those with the “placebo e-cigarettes abstained.”

        On its website, NBC News (9/8, Fox, 6.68M) reported that Dr. Tim McAfee, director of the CDC Office on Smoking and Health, said, “We don’t know much about” e-cigarettes. However, Dr. McAfee “says they could potentially be useful if tobacco companies would stop making products like cigarettes and make e-cigarettes instead – and if those e-cigarettes did indeed turn out to be less harmful than conventional cigarettes.”

        The Time (9/8, Sifferlin, 13.36M) “Healthland” blog pointed out that “the FDA is likely to consider these studies, among others, as it considers what to do about” the devices. Also covering the story were the NPR(9/8, Shute, 405K) “Shots” blog, Bloomberg News (9/8, Kresge, 1.41M), HealthDay (9/8, Preidt, 2K), andMedPage Today (9/8, Phend, 185K).