First trial of antiviral monkeypox drug that could speed recovery begins in UK

The first clinical trial in patients with monkeypox of an antiviral drug has begun in the UK.

The trial, known as Platinum, will look at whether the drug can reduce the time it takes for skin wounds to heal.

It is thought that the drug stops the monkeypox virus from replicating within the body and shortening the infectious period.

While the drug is available for patients in the hospital, it is not available for patients in the community.

Platinum is being run by the team who led the Recovery trial, and has already begun recruiting patients. Covid underscored the importance of running clinical trials to provide results during an outbreak and the team hopes results can be available before Christmas.

Prof Sir Martin Landray, a joint chief investigator of the trial at the University of Oxford, said that in a public health emergency the response is not about rushing around giving out tablets that you think might work. It is about responding to the results that you see and finding out as quickly as possible what works and what doesn't.

Men who have sex with men are more likely to contract monkeypox in countries where the disease is not endemic. Monkeypox was declared a public health emergency by the World Health Organization.

Many people think the disease is over in a few weeks, but it can cause a lot of problems.

According to Prof Sir Peter Horby, the co-lead of the trial at the University of Oxford, about 10% of patients end up in the hospital.

He said that there was no proven effective treatment for monkeypox, but that it was the frontrunner due to the fact that it had been shown to be safe in healthy humans.

500 patients with monkeypox who don't need hospital care will be recruited for the study. The placebo tablets will be given to participants randomly and they will be asked to take them twice a day for fourteen days.

The trial will be open to people who are HIV positive or immunocompromised, with Horby noting the latter groups may be more at risk of severe disease.

The researchers said that if the drug was found to be safe and effective, they would work with the government and others to make sure that patients had access to it.

Dr Cheryl Walter, a virologist at the University of Hull who is not involved with the trial, said that the drug had undergone rigorous testing. She said the potential for a post-exposure drug that could help prevent further onward transmission came at a crucial time, given the shortage of the vaccine.

Public health bodies in the UK are trialling smaller doses of the vaccine in people who are at risk of exposure to monkeypox.

The study was welcomed by a professor of international public health. It becomes very difficult or impossible to do clinical trials of diseases that are only seen in a small number during an outbreak if you do trials during an outbreak.

Monkeypox can cause distressing symptoms, even though it rarely kills, so any drug that can be shown to improve recovery will be welcomed.