A Victorian doctor has sparked controversy, calling for electronic cigarettes to be recognised as an effective tool to quit smoking.

Ballarat GP Attila Danko said he was hooked on traditional cigarettes for 30 years, until he took up e-cigarettes.

"I tried all the usual things, all the patches, all the gums, but I was always tempted back to smoking until I found e-cigarettes," he said.

The battery-powered inhalers simulate the feeling of smoking, but without the addictive tobacco.

Dr Danko is pushing for e-cigarettes to be recognised as a better alternative to standard cigarettes, and a way to help addicts butt out.

He cited a recent British health report that found using e-cigarettes, otherwise known as "vaping", was 95 percent less harmful than smoking.

Dr Danko said e-cigarettes are 95 percent less harmful than smoking tobacco. (AAP)

Dr Danko has now set up independent advocacy group New Nicotine Alliance Australia.

"You feel like you are smoking but not taking in all the tar and the smoke, all the stuff that kills you," he said.

Nationally, the sale of e-cigarettes containing nicotine is prohibited without a medical prescription.

Non-nicotine e-cigarettes are legal and more widely available. They come in a range of flavours, including tobacco.

Anti-smoking body QUIT told 9NEWS there is no firm evidence that vaping helps smokers give up.

"While e-cigarettes are potentially less harmful than tobacco, they're certainly not harmless, and that's our problem, we don't know what the short or long term health impacts are," QUIT Victoria Acting Director Kylie Lindorff said.

Other research suggests teenagers who use electronic vaporisers will eventually switch to traditional cigarettes.

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