The Daily Mail
London, UK
Published 16 August, 2006



A 'wonder pill' that appears to help smokers kick the habit could soon be on sale in Britain.

Chantix, which works by mimicking the effects of nicotine on the body, has already been approved by the drug licensing body in America.

It is now being considered by European regulators and could be launched in the UK within months.

Research published today in the prestigious Archives of Internal Medicine, found that almost half the people who took Chantix were successfully able to quit.

The trials suggest it is more effective than Zyban, the current gold-standard anti-smoking drug.

Chantix - also known as varenicline tartrate - stimulates the same brain receptors as nicotine to help kill tobacco cravings.

The drug, which will be marketed in the UK under the name Champix, is also said to block withdrawal symptoms.

It has been developed by Pfizer, the global pharmaceutical firm behind the anti-impotence drug Viagra and the cholesterol-busting drug Lipitor.

If successful, the second anti-smoking pill to go on the market could rake in hundreds of millions of pounds each year.

Research published today showed that it can successfully help people give up cigarettes.

In a study, researchers from Los Angeles Clinical Trials and the Varenicline Study Group, randomly assigned 626 people to either Chantix at three different doses, to Zyban, or to a placebo.

The participants, who were aged between 18 and 65, used their assigned study drug for a week before quitting cigarettes completely. They took the pills for about seven weeks, then were followed for a year.

At the end of four weeks, 48 per cent of participants who took Chantix twice daily successfully broke their habit compared with 33 per cent on Zyban and 17 per cent of people given a dummy drug.

At the end of 12 weeks, the confirmed continuous quit rates were 38.8 percent for the highest dose of varenicline, 19.8 percent for zyban , and 10.6 percent for placebo.

Craving was significantly reduced at all weekly time points for those taking the highest dose of varenicline compared with placebo. Zyban also reduced craving, but to a lesser extent.

Dr Mitchell Nides said: "In this study Chantix taken twice daily effectively helped subjects quit smoking, with a response rate three times higher than those for placebo."

The research showed the pill had some side effects, including nausea but spacing out the doses over the course of the day appeared to lessen the impact.

Co-researcher Dr Cheryl Oncken, from the University of Connecticut, added: "Varenicline was well tolerated and may provide a novel therapy to aid smoking cessation."

About 12 million adults in the UK smoke cigarettes, about 28 per of men and 24 per cent of women.

The numbers are down from 1974, when just over half of men and 41 per cent of women smoked.

Each year around 114,000 deaths in the UK are attributed to smoking.

However, only about 15 per cent of people who take advantage of NHS Stop Smoking services manage to quit cigarettes long term.

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