WIDELY prescribed anti-cholesterol drugs are being tested to see whether they could be used to help treat multiple sclerosis (MS). Experts have launched an assessment to see whether cheap statins may become an MS treatment as well as lowering cholesterol.
The six-year trial will involve 1,180 people with secondary progressive MS at almost 30 centres across the UK, with the first participants starting medication later this year. The £6 million project will test simvastatin in people with the secondary progressive form of MS.
MS affects more than 100,000 people in the UK.
Lead researcher Dr Jeremy Chataway said: "This study will establish definitively whether simvastatin is able to slow the rate of disability progression over a three year period, and we are very hopeful it will."
