Don't know what you read, but it sounds like the stats that have been known for some time.  Around 95% of smokers fail to quit if they try "cold turkey", and around 92% fail to quit if they try with the patch or other nicotine replacement therapies.  It speaks to just how hard it is to quit.

What Picard favours, in this and other articles, is to acknowledge that some people can't quit and embrace vaping as a harm reduction strategy.  Smokers aren't quitting nicotine by switching to vaping, but they are quitting smoking.

And if some people do try vaping as an attempt to wean themselves from nicotine entirely, it's likely no worse than any other nicotine replacement therapy.