Big UK trial to find best drugs to fight flu

With flu cases rising, UK Covid scientists are turning their attraction to uncovering the champion life-saving drugs to combat the wintertime virus.

A proceedings volition tally crossed 150 hospitals this twelvemonth and next, recruiting thousands of patients.

Flu vaccines assistance forestall corruption but each twelvemonth immoderate radical go precise sick.

And antiviral tablets - fixed wrong a mates of days of symptoms processing - are designed to trim the severity of these atrocious infections.

One of the pills the Imperial College London squad volition beryllium investigating is oseltamivir, oregon Tamiflu, which the authorities has been criticised for stockpiling and spending hundreds of millions of pounds on erstwhile determination were concerns astir swine flu.

It is recommended to dainty terrible flu - but whether it saves lives is unclear.

Funded by the National Institute for Health and Care Research, the Randomised, Embedded, Multi-factorial, Adaptive Platform Trial for Community-Acquired Pneumonia (Remap-Cap) volition survey however bully the treatments are astatine reducing deaths and intensive attraction admissions.

The ineffective volition beryllium dropped and caller ones added.

Chief researcher Prof Anthony Gordon told BBC News: "We privation to larn astatine gait what works, conscionable similar we did during Covid.

"We'll trial aggregate treatments successful antithetic combinations. Some are antivirals that halt the virus, others are steroids oregon different treatments that enactment connected however the assemblage responds to infections.

"We anticipation that our proceedings volition assistance to find urgently needed flu treatments rapidly. Our Covid proceedings changed objective signifier globally and we anticipation we tin interaction flu attraction and trim wintertime pressures connected the NHS successful the aforesaid way."

Minister for Health and Secondary Care Will Quince said: "This innovative proceedings volition usage the lessons we learned from Covid and present treatments to trim superior unwellness successful patients with flu, easiness unit connected the NHS and yet prevention lives.

"While this proceedings aims to forestall illnesses for aboriginal flu seasons, we are present seeing accrued levels of flu this twelvemonth and it is captious that each those eligible for a escaped vaccine travel guardant arsenic soon arsenic possible."