CHILDREN as young as 12 will be prescribed nicotine patches to help them quit smoking.

After a successful pilot project that started last year, all six secondary schools in the Derwentside district of County Durham will offer nicotine replacement therapy to children aged 12 to 17.

School nurses will be able to offer patches to children who show signs of being addicted to cigarettes. Health professionals believe it will substantially improve their chances of kicking the habit at an early age.

According to national statistics, about one per cent of children aged 11 are regular smokers.

Among children aged 11 to 15, the figures rise to seven per cent of boys and ten per cent of girls, while among 16-year-olds, as many as 16 per cent of boys and 26 per cent of girls regularly smoke.

In the North-East, the figures are believed to be marginally higher than the national average.

Iain Miller, of Derwentside Primary Care Trust, said: "We have to recognise that kids as young as that become addicted to nicotine.

"It does not take much to become addicted to nicotine."

He said that once children had learned how to inhale smoke, they could become addicted after as few as only three cigarettes.

He said: "Then you can be talking about a lifetime of smoking, with all the consequences that involves."

A small pilot programme run at Greencroft School, in Annfield Plain, last year resulted in just under half the small sample of children stopping smoking.

A second scheme has been in operation at Stanley School of Technology, where health professionals came together yesterday to agree plans that would allow the service to be expanded in Derwentside.

Under the plans, which have taken six months to draw up, nurses are asked to encourage young people to tell their parents they have been given patches, although parental consent is not compulsory.

Supporters say the use of nicotine replacement therapy doubles a smoker's chances of successfully giving up, and said they were four times as likely to succeed if they also had help and advice from health specialists.