Kerry Grens
Reuters
A vaccination campaign to prevent teenagers from taking up smoking would be too expensive to recommend, according to Australian researchers who looked at the costs and benefits of anti-nicotine shots in development.
Taking into account the effectiveness demonstrated so far by experimental vaccines designed to help smokers quit, the team concluded the drugs would need to be cheaper, require fewer doses and get better results for widespread preventive vaccination of teens to be worthwhile.
“On the data that is currently available on NicVax and other nicotine vaccines these scenarios are unrealistic,” said Coral Gartner, a researcher at the University of Queensland who led the study.
Read More: Broad anti-smoking vaccination not worth cost: study
Cartoon by Bob Moran