Pregnant smokers are more likely to quit the habit if they are offered shopping vouchers worth £400, according to researchers.
They have published the results of a trial involving 600 women from Glasgow and Clyde in the British Medical Journal.
More than 20 per cent of the women, from offered vouchers stopped smoking, compared with 9 per cent given normal NHS support alone.
During the trial, the women who took part have breath tests and provided saliva and urine samples to check whether they were smoking. Their blood samples were also monitored.
The control group were offered a lot of support, including face-to-face appointment with a smoking cessation adviser, four follow-up phone calls and free nicotine replacement therapy for 10 weeks.
After a year, 15 per cent of women who received the vouchers had managed to stay off cigarettes, compared with 4 per cent in the control group.
