UsAgainstAlzheimer’s Calls on Congress to Increase Funding for Alzheimer’s Research at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to $2.65 Billion for Fiscal Year 2020

Washington D.C. (April 1, 2018) – UsAgainstAlzheimer’s chairman George Vradenburg today issued the following statement calling for an additional $350 million in the NIH’s FY 2020 budget for Alzheimer’s research.

“Congress should increase funding for Alzheimer’s research at the National Institutes of Health for Fiscal Year 2020 by $350 million from $2.3 billion in FY 2019 to $2.65 billion. Year-over-year funding for Alzheimer’s research has increased at a historic pace over the past five years, and this trend must continue if we are to achieve our goal of preventing Alzheimer’s and developing a cure by 2025.”

“Alzheimer’s is the greatest public health crisis facing our nation today. There are currently 5.8 million Americans suffering from Alzheimer’s, a number that will increase to nearly 14 million by 2050 if there is no breakthrough treatment or cure developed. We know that if we invest the requisite resources into research, we can cure and treat diseases that were once thought incurable. We’ve seen it with both HIV/AIDs and cancer. Funding increases for Alzheimer’s research must reflect the severity of this crisis.”

“As the recent termination of Biogen and Eisai’s clinical trials for aducanumab has demonstrated, Alzheimer’s is more complex to treat than we could have ever anticipated. While we are satisfied with increasing research funding $350 million dollars for FY 2020, we believe that moving forward an even greater investment is needed. In addition to relentlessly pursuing a pharmacological cure, we must invest equal resources to better understand how proactive measures taken to promote brain health across the lifespan can delay or even prevent Alzheimer’s disease.”

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