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Hospitals should stock e-cigarettes for sale to patients and permit “vaping” in private rooms as part of the NHS ”smoke free” efforts, according to health chiefs.

The consensus statement, published by Scotland's national health education and promotion agency, was agreed by the Scottish government, health boards, academia and charities such as the British Lung Foundation and Cancer Research UK.

New vaping in public places advice recognises there is no one-size-fits-all approach.

For vapers in the USA the news has been almost unrelentingly bad all year. There are signs that may be changing, however. A county court struck down a proposed new law that would have treated vaping as smoking, while a major think tank is attacking the idea of vape taxes. Meanwhile a business owner is suing Pennsylvania over its wide-ranging 40% tax. It’s too early to say a corner has been turned, but things look slightly better than in recent months.

It is becoming increasingly difficult to make the case against E-Cigarettes on the basis of scientific evidence. A second Cochrane review, the gold standard when it comes to assessing the state of the evidence on hot topics from salt to fat to smoking has concluded that these nicotine delivering devices that involve no combustion may help smokers quit without serious health consequences.

Growth in the use of E-Cigarettes in England has been associated with a higher rate of successful attempts to quit smoking, reveals a study published by The BMJ (British Medical Journal) today.