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The Minister for Research and Innovation, Sean Sherlock, TD, today [Thursday] welcomed the joint EU research programme established to tackle neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s Disease.

Addressing the Management Board of the EU Joint Programme for Neurodegenerative Disease at their annual meeting in Dublin Castle, the Minister said neurodegenerative diseases pose a major challenge for an ageing European and Irish population.

It is estimated that in Ireland alone 44,000 people currently have Alzheimer’s or other dementias, and that this will rise to 104,000 by 2036, mainly due to the ageing of the Irish population. Almost 9,000 further Irish people have other major neurodegenerative diseases, such as Parkinson’s Disease, Huntington’s disease or Motor Neurone Disease.

Minister Sherlock said: "There are almost no therapies for these diseases and treatment is effectively only for alleviation of symptoms. Apart from the effects of these diseases on patients and their families, there is also a major associated public health cost, due to their slow onset and progress¸and their debilitating nature.

"History has shown that advances in disease research are commonly the result of high-level exchanges between researchers from different disciplines and sufficient investments by a strong involvement of governments. By increasing coordination of national funding, and by bringing leading European researchers together with relevant funding agencies, the joint research programme is increasing the opportunity to accelerate research efforts over the next decade.

"Ireland is a very committed member of this joint research effort with the Health Research Board and Science Foundation Ireland leading the development of an Irish Strategic Research Agenda in this area, to identify a common national vision on how to address the enormous social challenge of Neurodegenerative Diseases. It will map the existing national R&D activity and use this information to develop a coordinated national programme, which is relevant to the EU-wide activities, but also relevant to national needs and expertise.

Concluding Minister Sherlock said: "The Irish Government is committed to doing all it can to ensure that Irish researchers are in a position to participate in European research initiatives. Ireland is currently undertaking a comprehensive research prioritisation project scheduled for completion next month. The purpose of this review is to identify those areas of opportunity or challenge for Ireland with potential to deliver the greatest return to the economy. The findings from this project will shape priorities for public R&D investment. This in turn will enable us to interact more effectively with EU level partnering approaches. By having clear, up-to-date priorities for our public R&D investment we can better contribute to the development and delivery of relevant strategic research agendas and implementation plans at EU level".