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The injection is recommended as an additional maintenance treatment for patients over 12 when usual medications have not proven effective enough
Storm NewtonWednesday 26 November 2025 23:30 GMT
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A monthly injection could enable severe asthma patients to entirely stop daily steroid tablets without affecting their symptoms, a new trial has found.
The drug, Tezepelumab (also known as Tezspir and made by AstraZeneca), works by binding to and blocking a protein that drives airway inflammation.
The injection is recommended as an additional maintenance treatment for patients over 12 when usual medications have not proven effective enough.
It was approved for NHS use by the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) in 2023.
Severe asthma is commonly treated with daily steroid tablets.
However, taking steroids for long periods can have side effects such as mood changes, stomach problems or weight gain, as well as issues that develop over time such as steroid-induced diabetes or osteoporosis.
A new trial, known as Wayfinder and led by King’s College London, included almost 300 people with severe, uncontrolled asthma on a maintenance dose of between 5mg and 40mg of steroid tablets a day.
Patients were recruited from 11 countries including the UK, US, France, Germany, Mexico and Spain.
The trial found treatment with tezepelumab helped 90 per cent of patients reduce their daily steroid dose.
More than half who had the injection were able to stop daily steroids altogether after 12 months.
The trial found treatment with tezepelumab helped 90 per cent of asthma patients reduce their daily steroid dose (Alamy/PA)Meanwhile, two thirds of patients stopped having asthma attacks, which was observed as early as two weeks into the trial and lasted for the duration of the year-long study.
Professor David Jackson, respiratory medicine expert at King’s College London, and clinical lead of the asthma services across Guy’s and Royal Brompton Hospitals, said: “The Wayfinder study is an important step forward for patients with the most severe form of asthma who require daily oral steroids in order to achieve reasonable disease control.
“In this international, multi-centre clinical trial of more than 300 patients, the Nice-approved asthma treatment tezepelumab, a biologic therapy that targets asthma-related inflammation but without all the side effects of steroids, was capable of allowing the vast majority of patients to wean their steroids down to a low dose with over half able to stop their steroids altogether.
“As tezepelumab also suppresses allergy-related symptoms and improves chronic rhinosinusitis as well, the results are particularly exciting for patients with severe asthma who suffer with both upper and lower airway symptoms.”
Reacting to the study, Dr Samantha Walker, director of research and innovation at Asthma + Lung UK, said: ”This is an incredibly encouraging development for the future of asthma care that could transform the lives of people with severe asthma.
“It’s vital that research into new types of treatment continues but we know current funding for lung health research is on life-support, despite lung conditions remaining the third biggest cause of death in the UK.
“Studies like this show the positive impact that research can make on providing potentially life-changing treatment for people with asthma and other lung conditions.”
The findings of the Wayfinder trial are published in the Lancet Respiratory Medicine and will be presented at the British Thoracic Society Winter Meeting 2025 on Thursday.
