UK: New £50M research centre targets cures for inflammatory diseases

[Andy]

"MRC is investing £50 million in a new centre investigating chronic inflammatory diseases, which place a major burden on patients, health services and the economy.

A new centre, funded by the Medical Research Council (MRC), and led by the University of Birmingham will develop innovative therapies aimed at restoring immune balance and tissue health.

Lasting freedom from disease

Its ambition is to achieve lasting freedom from disease and transform the lives of people who face debilitating immune-mediated diseases (IMIDs) throughout their lives.

These conditions, including inflammatory arthritis, inflammatory bowel disease, autoimmune liver disease and Sjögren’s disease can affect children and adults."

Full article

 

[Jonathan Edwards]

Professor Adam P Croft, Arthritis UK Chair of Rheumatology and Director of the MRC CoRE in Restorative Immunology, said:

While remarkable advances have been made in the treatment of immune-mediated inflammatory diseases over the past two decades, the focus has largely been on controlling inflammation to relieve symptoms and prevent damage to tissues. This approach has improved the lives of many patients, but it does not address the underlying mechanisms that cause and sustain disease.

Our patients are clear: they want more than lifelong disease management – they want the possibility of cure. New technologies now permit us to study tissues at unprecedented resolution, revealing how healthy tissue becomes diseased and identifying the cells and molecular pathways that drive this process.

Combined with the development of therapies capable of precisely targeting these mechanisms, this creates a realistic opportunity to move beyond lifelong disease control towards treatments delivered with curative intent – with the ultimate goal of restoring lasting health and wellbeing.

Maybe Dr Croft hadn't noticed that this is what we were trying to do in the 1990s. Judging by the vague remarks about tissue at unprecedented resolution (eh? why do you need to do that) he hasn't a clue where he is going. He could start by reading the literature.

This is the nonsense of where funding goes that we are up against even with headline diseases. Not surprising it is such a nightmare for ME/CFS.

 

[hotblack]

While a single figure tracking the cost to the NHS of all IMIDs combined does not exist, inflammatory bowel disease alone costs the NHS up to £900 million each year

Seeing that quote does show how we’re in a position whereby because we are excluded from the healthcare system we don’t have visibility on the balance sheet so the investment in research to improve things for us is harder to make in comparison to other conditions.

That nobody ‘owns’ us within the healthcare system also means nobody within that system has any motivation to improve things.

Responsibility, economics and incentives… they matter.

 

[BrightCandle]

Seeing that quote does show how we’re in a position whereby because we are excluded from the healthcare system we don’t have visibility on the balance sheet so the investment in research to improve things for us is harder to make in comparison to other conditions.

We don't really cost them much because they refuse to see us or do anything with us. Since most patients aren't diagnosed there is no accounting to assign what appointments do happen. The only cost basis you can go off is government driven, PIP and out of work benefits and that sort of thing but even they don't record ME/CFS very often, such is the level of prejudice against the disease no one even writes the disease down not even on our death certificates. The disease has been systemically eradicated and hence there is no accounting.