News & Events
Campaign for Government research funding gets a boost
15 December 2006
Multi-million pound Government investment into Motor Neurone Disease research may be a step closer following a visit by Health Minister Andy Burnham MP to a leading MND Care Centre.
Mr Burnham met patients, researchers and staff at the King's College Hospital’s MND Care & Research Centre, in London, yesterday (Thursday), following an invitation from the MND Association.
In a meeting with representatives from the charity and the MND research community as part of his visit, Mr Burnham said he expected to make a statement about MND research funding in early February.
The MND Association has previously presented Mr Burnham, Minister for Delivery and Quality in the Department of Health, with the business case urging Government investment of £7.5 million into research towards finding a cure for the disease.
MND is a fatal and rapidly progressive disease that affects 5,000 people in the UK. Most people die within two to five years. The cause is not known in the majority of cases, and there is no cure.
However, the MND Association believes that there has never been a better time to make significant advances toward finding a cure, if only the funding was available.
In October, it launched the MND Association Research Foundation to raise £7.5 million for research - and has challenged the Government to do the same.
Christopher Shaw, Professor of Neurology and Neurogenetics at King's College London, pressed the case for increased Government research funding as part of today's visit.
He said: "Advances in scientific technology have given us an extraordinary opportunity to increase our understanding the disease mechanisms and I am confident that this will lead to the discovery of new treatments.
"There are many experiments that we’d like to do if only we had the resources to do them. Increased funding from the Government would dramatically accelerate the rate of progress."
After the visit, Dr Kirstine Knox, Chief Executive of the MND Association, said she hoped that meeting people with the disease would help convince the Minister of the urgent need for more money.
She said: "The Minister got a glimpse today of the frontline of MND research, and a strong idea of how more money can drive that research forwards to a cure. And by meeting people with this devastating terminal disease, he can see why that research is so desperately needed."
Mr Burnham met patients, researchers and staff at the King's College Hospital’s MND Care & Research Centre, in London, yesterday (Thursday), following an invitation from the MND Association.
In a meeting with representatives from the charity and the MND research community as part of his visit, Mr Burnham said he expected to make a statement about MND research funding in early February.
The MND Association has previously presented Mr Burnham, Minister for Delivery and Quality in the Department of Health, with the business case urging Government investment of £7.5 million into research towards finding a cure for the disease.
MND is a fatal and rapidly progressive disease that affects 5,000 people in the UK. Most people die within two to five years. The cause is not known in the majority of cases, and there is no cure.
However, the MND Association believes that there has never been a better time to make significant advances toward finding a cure, if only the funding was available.
In October, it launched the MND Association Research Foundation to raise £7.5 million for research - and has challenged the Government to do the same.
Christopher Shaw, Professor of Neurology and Neurogenetics at King's College London, pressed the case for increased Government research funding as part of today's visit.
He said: "Advances in scientific technology have given us an extraordinary opportunity to increase our understanding the disease mechanisms and I am confident that this will lead to the discovery of new treatments.
"There are many experiments that we’d like to do if only we had the resources to do them. Increased funding from the Government would dramatically accelerate the rate of progress."
After the visit, Dr Kirstine Knox, Chief Executive of the MND Association, said she hoped that meeting people with the disease would help convince the Minister of the urgent need for more money.
She said: "The Minister got a glimpse today of the frontline of MND research, and a strong idea of how more money can drive that research forwards to a cure. And by meeting people with this devastating terminal disease, he can see why that research is so desperately needed."
