May 21, 2020

the Randomised Evaluation of COVID-19 Therapy (RECOVERY) trial

A range of potential treatments have been suggested for COVID-19, but nobody knows whether any of them will be more effective in helping people recover than the usual standard of hospital care which all patients receive.

The RECOVERY trial is the world’s largest randomised clinical trial (RCT) of potential COVID-19 treatments and the fastest ever recruiting RCT. It is testing the effects of potential treatments for patients admitted to hospital with COVID-19. Over the last two months, the trial has recruited over 10,000 patients from hospitals across the UK.

This background briefing focused on the RECOVERY trial and the need for RCTs to provide reliable evidence in the wake of high profile calls for use of treatments which have not yet been adequately tested.

Our speakers provided an insight into this unprecedented trial which has been classed as an Urgent Public Health Research Study. Journalists joined the Chief Investigator, Peter Horby, and Deputy Chief Investigator, Martin Landray, who shed light on their efforts to provide definitive answers on the use of existing treatments for COVID-19 patients.

Please note – initial results from the trial are expected in late June and did not form part of this background briefing.

Speakers included:

Prof Peter Horby, Professor of Emerging Infectious Diseases and Global Health in the Nuffield Department of Medicine, University of Oxford and Chief Investigator of the RECOVERY trial

Prof Martin Landray, Professor of Medicine and Epidemiology at the Nuffield Department of Population Health, University of Oxford and Deputy Chief Investigator of the RECOVERY trial