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PDF printable version of $500 Million Boost to Health and Medical Research (PDF 29 KB)

29 October 2009

The Rudd Government today announced $487 million funding to boost the nation’s health and medical research effort.

This is in addition to $21 million announced by the Prime Minister and during a recent visit to Tasmania, taking the total to $508 million.

The $487 million funding announced today will be provided through the National Health and Medical Research Council, Australia’s peak funding body for health and medical research.

It includes:

• 675 Project Grants, supporting individuals and teams conducting research into all areas of health, totalling $380 million
• 13 Enabling Grants, to ensure the future of essential national research facilities and resources such as the Twin Registry and brain and cancer tissue specimen collections, totalling $18 million
• 54 Career Development Awards, to enable early career researchers to establish themselves as independent researchers in all areas of health, totalling $20.7 million
• Research Fellowships for outstanding researchers with proven track records who carry out research that is of major importance in their field – 75 new Fellowships, 19 sixth-year Fellowships (funding an extra year for existing Fellows) and six grants-in-aid – $53 million
• 16 Practitioner Fellowships, totalling $6.5 million, for researchers who combine their work as clinicians or in public health with essential medical research
• 55 Standard Equipment Grants, aimed at helping Australian institutions buy larger items of equipment to support competitively-funded health and medical research, totalling $9 million
• funding of $50,000 for Australia’s membership of the Human Genome Organization, an international organisation of scientists promoting international collaboration within the Human Genome Project.

The earlier funding announced by the Prime Minister will provide $21 million for the first ever nationwide Partnership for Better Health Grants. The 27 projects funded by these grants will help researchers work directly with health organisations so that research results can be better tailored to real world situations.

The largest slice of the overall funding has gone to Project Grants, which are provided to Australia’s most prominent health and medical researchers. They include:

Professor Edna Hardeman, University of New South Wales, $619,500 Muscle stem cells – this study will enhance understanding of muscle stem cells and provide evidence for a universal approach to the uptake of stem cells by a target tissue, with the goal of repairing this tissue.

Professor Brian Kelly, University of Newcastle, NSW, $805,651 Mental health and wellbeing in rural and remote NSW – this unique rural Australian study will investigate individual, family and community factors associated with the mental health and wellbeing of residents in NSW rural communities.

Professor Sandra Eades, Baker IDI Heart and Diabetes Institute, Victoria, $1,311,000 Improving care of Type 2 diabetes among Indigenous Australians – this important research will test the effectiveness of a collaborative approach to improving health outcomes for Indigenous Australians with Type 2 diabetes.

Dr Rachel Neale, Queensland Institute of Medical Research, $427,700 Does vitamin D supplementation reduce mortality for older adults?– this pilot trial will examine whether high-dose vitamin D supplementation can reduce chronic disease and early death in older people, leading to improved quality of life for this growing population group.

Professor Wayne Tilley, University of Adelaide, SA, $688,875 Aberrant androgen (hormone) receptor signalling and prostate cancer – this research aims to better predict the course of prostate cancer at diagnosis, thereby leading to better, tailored treatments for individual patients.

Professor Adrian Sleigh, Australian National University, ACT, $1,571,175 Thai Health-Risk Transition: a National Cohort Study - Phase II – this pioneering study will capture information on changing health risks in Thailand associated with economic development and modernisation. This project reflects the NHMRC’s mandate to improve health in our region.

Professor Jon Emery, University of Western Australia, $333,125 FAST- Australia: family history screening for chronic disease prevention in primary care – this project will develop and evaluate a family history questionnaire in preparation for a trial of family history screening and its impact on prevention of certain cancers, heart disease and diabetes.

Dr Jim Stankovich, Menzies Research Institute, Tasmania, $286,350 Identifying rare genetic variants conferring susceptibility to multiple sclerosis – this study aims to identify rare genetic variants that have strong effects on the susceptibility to multiple sclerosis, with the goal of reducing the high incidence of MS in the Tasmanian population.

Associate Professor Ross Andrews, Menzies School of Health Research, NT, $1,257,125 Impact of an antibiotic administration program against endemic scabies and strongyloidiasis – this study will be a critical first step in establishing if the use of the antibiotic ivermectin in mass drug administration programs can be successful in a remote Indigenous community setting, where the disease burden from scabies and strongyloidiasis (threadworm infections) is very high.

Media contacts: Minister Roxon’s office, 02 6277 7220

Carolyn Norrie, NHMRC, 0422 008 512 or 02 6217 9190