A new collaboration between two of the UK’s largest charities has today (Monday, October 5) been announced. Marie Curie Cancer Care is to invest an additional £1m a year in a new national programme into end of life care research working with expertise from Cancer Research UK.
Marie Curie Cancer Care will launch a new research fund for end of life care research across the UK, with expert advice on research applications, grant funding and the peer review process from Cancer Research UK.
Now is the time to deliver a real boost to innovation, improvement and research into better end of life care in the UK. This is why Marie Curie has made the decision to invest more into palliative care research across the UK, doing our best to address the current under-funding for such crucial work. Bringing the expertise of Cancer Research UK on board will ensure all research proposals are thoroughly reviewed and expertly assessed. It’s a great example of co-operation between two major charities with different but complementary strengths.
Dr Teresa Tate, Medical Advisor for Marie Curie Cancer Care
We are delighted to help Marie Curie Cancer Care to fund new work in this important area of research. Marie Curie has great expertise and knowledge around end of life care and we look forward to helping them develop a coherent and rigorous research programme in this area of acknowledged under-investment. The strengths of both charities will combine to create a unique opportunity to deliver world class research in this field.
Lilian Clark, Executive Director Science Operations and Funding at Cancer Research UK
Currently around £400m is spent every year in the UK on research into cancer prevention and cure, with less than £20m spent on end of life
research.
Marie Curie Cancer Care will issue a call for proposals in early 2010