HEALTH chiefs in East Lancashire are backing new research which suggests that smoking e-cigarettes may be no better than regular cigarettes.

According to a new study, the vapour from the electronic devices was shown to damage or even kill human cells during lab tests.

The research published by the Oral Oncology journal, comes as Public Health England and Prime Minister David Cameron backed the use of e-cigarettes to help people quit smoking.

Dr Damian Riley, Medical Director at East Lancashire Hospitals NHS Trust said they encourage the use of nicotine replacement therapy rather than e-cigarettes.

He said: "The smoking of e-cigarettes as well as regular cigarettes is not allowed in the buildings or in our grounds.

"We understand how hard it can be for patients to give up smoking and encourage the use of NRT (nicotine replacement therapy) to help them refrain from smoking while they are inpatients at the hospital."

Julie Trezise, Stop Smoking service manager at Lancashire Care NHS Foundation Trust also said it only supported the use of NRT.

She said: "We only recommend the use of evidence based approaches such as nicotine replacement therapy to support service users in remaining smokefree.

"Our service does not prescribe or recommend the use of e-cigarettes as these are unregulated and there is no evidence to suggest that they are an effective way of quitting smoking."

An estimated 2.6 million people in the UK use e-cigarettes. They are to be licensed and regulated as an aid to quit smoking on the NHS from 2016.

Fraser Cropper, Managing Director of Totally Wicked e-cigarette company, based in Blackburn, cast doubts on the study.

He said: "This is an in vitro study, and these types of study have been criticised before as they do not mimic real life cell responses.

"It is vitally important to remember that 99.9 per cent of vapers are current or former smokers.

"According to the most authoritative report on this subject, published by Public Health England last year, vaping is at least 95 per cent safer than smoking."

An estimated 2.6 million people in the UK use e-cigarettes. They are to be licensed and regulated as an aid to quit smoking from 2016.