A new vaccine against the winter vomiting bug, norovirus, is being tested on volunteers after preliminary findings indicated the injection elicited a “strong immune response”.

A vaccine is to be trialled on thousands of people to find out if it could protect against norovirus - a stomach bug that causes vomiting and diarrhoea. The easily spreadable winter virus can affect people of all ages and have huge consequences - often closing hospital wards, taking children out of school and keeping parents off work.

A randomised clinical trial of an mRNA vaccine against norovirus will be launched in the UK within the next two weeks, it has been announced.