Cutting-edge therapy is the first treatment that could put liver damage from ... trends now

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British scientists have developed a treatment that could stop deadly liver disease in its tracks.

The cutting-edge therapy is the first to treat cirrhosis, the scarring of liver tissue caused by heavy drinking, fatty diets and long-term infections from the viruses hepatitis B and C.

Currently there are no drugs or treatments to stop or reverse this process.

More than 10,000 people a year in the UK die from liver disease, and premature deaths have risen over 60 per cent in the past two decades.

The treatment, developed at The University of Edinburgh, involves taking a blood sample from a patient and extracting white cells called monocytes. These are infection-fighting cells that normally live in the blood for a few days, then migrate to the body’s tissues to turn into macrophages – cells able to repair damaged tissue.