NICENews

The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) has today (25 April) issued advice on the support that smokers should be offered in their workplace to help them quit smoking. The new advice comes as workplaces in England prepare to go smokefree from 1 July, creating an additional opportunity to help improve health by supporting those smokers who want to give up. Smoking costs the NHS an estimated £1.5 billion each year, and costs industry an estimated £5 billion in lost productivity, absenteeism and fire damage. The new laws banning smoking in workplaces are expected to motivate smokers who want to quit, to finally give up. Aimed mainly at employers, but also at employees and those responsible for ensuring workplaces go smokefree and for providing stop smoking support, the NICE guidance recommends the most effective ways to encourage and support employees to stop smoking. These include providing information on local stop smoking services, and allowing smokers to attend stop smoking clinics during working hours without loss of pay.

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