HEALTH Secretary Alan Milburn is backing a plan to speed up the treatment of heart attack victims which could save thousands of lives.

The Darlington MP, who has made the battle against heart disease a personal crusade, has asked medical watchdogs to consider radical new treatment plans.

Mr Milburn wants to see paramedics and nurses giving heart attack victims injections of a powerful new type of clot-busting drugs straight into their veins, saving minutes, which could make the difference between life and death.

Heart attack victims currently have to wait until they reach hospital before the most commonly used clot-dispersing drug, streptokinase, can be infused into their bodies via a drip.

At the moment, heart attacks strike about 270,000 Britons a year, half of whom die within 30 days.

About 60,000 patients a year receive streptokinase after a heart attack.

The Government wants to cut the delay between a 999 call and the time a drug is administered, to under 60 minutes.

A spokesman for Mr Milburn said: "This is a new way of administering a powerful new drug. It could make a real difference to many heart attack victims."

"Today we are publishing our work programme for the National Institute for Clinical Excellence (Nice).

"Included in that list is this potentially life-saving clot-busting drug, which is known as thrombolytic therapy.

"It is a drug that can be administered directly into the patient rather than through a drip.

"It can be given at the scene or in the ambulance. The key thing is that it can be delivered much faster."

Potentially, GPs could also inject the new drug, the aide said.

The only drawback is that it costs £600 a shot, which is ten times the cost of infusing streptokinase into a patient's arm.

Mr Milburn has asked the Nice expert panel to study the effectiveness of the new method.

If it gets the go-ahead it could be introduced across the UK within 18 months.

Recently, the Government changed the law to allow ambulance paramedics to administer streptokinase through a drip in an ambulance.

A ruling by Nice in favour of the drug would mean all health authorities would have to fund the new therapy, eliminating the so-called postcode lottery which has plagued the health service.