Dementia Researchers Call for Urgent Action to Prevent Setbacks in Treatment Search

Some 300 researchers have authored a letter to U.K. Science Minister Amanda Solloway, urging the British government to prevent a major setback in the search for new dementia treatments because of the COVID-19 pandemic, reports Medical Xpress . With the backing of Alzheimer's Research UK and the Alzheimer's Society, the signatories warn that lost funding opportunities could lead to a lost generation of researchers, jeopardizing the future of dementia research. The British medical research sector expects a £310 million gap in charity funding due to the pandemic, with medical research charities predicting an average 41 percent plunge in research spending for 2020-2021. Dementia researchers fear this could imperil critical progress in recent years, with the danger that many scientists may have to abandon dementia research completely. Concurrently, people with dementia are being battered by COVID-19, with 25 percent of all COVID-19 deaths in England and Wales occurring among those with dementia. "We are asking the government to continue its support for this growing field by delivering on its Manifesto commitment to double the dementia research budget, which will unlock new funding to enable early-career researchers to remain in a field where so much progress is urgently needed," the letter's signers wrote.