Talking about dementia research: Interview with Dr Sebastian Crutch

Over 1 million people are expected to have dementia in the UK by the year 2025, according to Alzheimer’s UK. Dementia describes various brain disorders that mean someone has lesser brain function, the most common of which is Alzheimer’s which affects 62 per cent of those diagnosed.

There is no current cure for dementia of any kind, and two thirds of the costs incurred by the disease are paid by patients and their families. Despite this, the government invests eight times less in dementia research than it does for cancer research. Take a look at Mo’ Money Mo’ Science post about the statistics here.

“It’s not that anyone thinks we should be spending less on cancer,” says Dr Sebastian Crutch, a neuropsychologist from the UCL Institute of Neurology. “It’s just that I think traditionally it’s quite an underfunded area, particularly in terms of socio-economic costs.”

We are often told by the government and NHS that we have an ageing population in the UK. Despite this, Dr Crutch believes that there is a lot of catching up to do in terms of dementia research. He says that research is generally around 20 years behind cancer research and social attitudes are similar as well. In previous generations, there was a stigma about dementia and it was often not talked about within families, as well as there being a lot of denial about the situation.

“I think now we’re much more inclined to talk about [dementia],” he says. “More people are getting it so more people will be increasingly aware of the priorities.”

In terms of funding, Dr Crutch believes he is in quite an enviable position, as he holds a fellowship from Alzheimer’s Research UK and the work in his group is quite translational. His research projects surround finding ways of improving the cognitive function of people with or at risk of dementia. For example, the Seeing what they see project aims to help people that are suffering from the visual problems associated with dementia, like hallucinations, falls and poor diet.

“Many of our research projects have an explicit patient benefit or at least patient involvement,” he explains. “So I think that’s quite an attractive point for funders.”

While some researchers might find it more of a challenge to show why they are researching something, “It’s easier for us to say what the impact or benefit will be for someone with dementia.” Nevertheless, Dr Crutch is confident that it researchers have a better chance now than there’s ever been to get funding thanks to raised awareness and understanding of degenerative brain diseases.

Dr Crutch also researches early-onset dementia, which he believes is an important area of research because services are sparser for younger people.

“Getting dementia in older age is obviously awful,” he says. “But if you’re working, got a mortgage to pay, your kids are at home, I think the impact is that much graver.”

He explains that there’s a real scientific benefit to working with younger people with dementia, as understanding the symptoms they are experiencing is that much less complicated.

“[Patients] are that much less likely to have strokes or associated vascular problems that older people would have,” explains Dr Crutch. “It makes it easier to paint a picture of the disease itself rather than just complications of their ageing.”

65000 are below the age of 65 when they get their first signs of dementia. Not only is dementia research important for an ageing population, but for younger patients too.

Alzheimer’s UK aims to increase their annual investment in research to more than £10 million by 2017, which is promising for researchers. One can only hope the Government catches up soon too.

A journalists’ take on the post-election state of science in the UK

Susan Watts is Head of Public Engagement and Communications – MRC Clinical Sciences Centre and former Science Editor of the BBC’s Newsnight programme. She interviewed six science spokespeople (in fact all spokesMEN) from the major political parties before the general election for The British Science Association’s ‘Science Matters’ series.

In his interview, Rt Hon Greg Clark, Conservative MP and Minister for Science, Universities & Cities mentioned the importance of political consensus with regards to science. Watts took that to mean “that we shouldn’t be looking to create division when the parties agree.”

“That’s reasonable so far as it goes, but I don’t really understand the calls for ‘consensus’ on science policy, because in my experience there are plenty of issues in the world of science where a consensus does not exist, and healthy debate is the norm.

Subjects with such a spectra of views include the ethics of xeno-transplantation, the extent of gene-editing technologies, or how best to tackle antimicrobial resistance.

“I suppose I worry that the word consensus might imply that it’s not good to rock the boat, and I think it usually is.”

Budget cuts and growing restrictions on immigration are two other issues which are sure to affect science. A push for commercially-applicable research to support a growth in the economy is likely to be at the forefront of the new Conservative government. While this would be beneficial for some scientists, it could also spell the end for some publicly-funded basic science research projects.

“On the immigration issue, I think that all parties have taken on board the potential for harm to the UK science base of giving the impression that we are not welcoming to the best ideas, wherever they come from.”

 

need info on how Science policies will affect you? see our @BritSciAssoc films http://t.co/cF6YkL7PNu #ScienceMatters #Election2015

— Susan Watts (@susanwatts01) May 5, 2015

Rt Hon Liam Byrne, Labour MP and Shadow Minister for Universities, Science & Skills said the issues (and potential solutions) with science and politics were as clear-cut as people, institutions, and money.

“Well it’s getting the mix of those right that’s the hard bit, but I would always put my faith in people ahead of institutions and money to come up with the most exciting and valuable science.

But people still need institutions and money to help them to do their best work.”

Several of the science spokespeople used the term ‘pro-science’ in reference to their own views (and the views of their respective parties).

“I’m not sure I know what that phrase means. It would have been a shock (and a story) if any of our Science Matters interviewees had said they were ‘anti-science’.

If it means a promise to listen to the science voice in the cultural mix then that’s critically important to the future of the UK, and welcome.”

Here’s another Mo’ Money Mo’ Science interview with a science journalist.

Research funding: A journalist’s perspective

Adam Smith from Research Fortnight on covering science funding in the UK.

It underpins many of the things we place importance on in the world around us; health care, education, energy and our environment, for a start. It’s hard to disagree that science is vital, but yet the topic of science funding often falls by the way side.

Adam Smith is a senior reporter at Research Fortnight, a UK publication dedicated to covering research funding and policymaking. Whilst he works for a specialist publication focused on audiences who are already interested in this topic, he believes that the wider audiences of mainstream media sometimes don’t see the bigger picture of why science funding is important, but understandably so.

“The people whose jobs are on the line are middle class scientists. They are educated and have a lot of cultural and social capital. They are very privileged in many ways. So its not like we are taking money away from people who are severely disadvantaged in society, so that may be one of the reasons why it doesn’t get as much public attention”.

Reductions in science funding obviously effects innovation, but audiences might sometimes see it in terms of the people it affects in the job market. In this case, it’s the academic elite. Adam argues that the times that science research funding does make it to the main stream media is if there is a strong headline that people can easily relate to as important, for example, cuts in cancer research funding. It might be harder to easily explain why we should publicly fund scientists who are researching the acid from the guts of certain worms, because this could help us learn more about how to decompose plastics, which would intern be important for the environment and for us. The former is quite obviously catchier.

Adam began covering research funding three years ago, when he was a Science Journalism MA student at City University, and has continued to do so since.

“Science interests me and politics interest me and so science funding is those two things combined. Where the politics comes in, is once you’re using public money to fund that, then it becomes a political conversation because you have to weigh it up against other political priorities, like the NHS or the school system”.

How does UK science funding compare to other countries?

The UK government spends around 1.7% of its GDP a year on science research and development, which is fairly low compared to other EU countries, as well as other developed nations outside of the EU. Adam doesn’t believe that this necessarily means the UK is not spending enough. After all, what is enough?

“We are pretty much the best in the world in terms of productivity and bang for the buck. There was a report published in 2013 that was done by Elsevier and it basically found that the UK, considering its population and percentage of GDP spent on research and development, produces an incredibly large amount of research. So we are very productive and efficient with the funding we use,” he argues.

The report in question, published by the Department of Business, Innovation and Skills found that while the UK represents just 0.9% of the global population, 3.2% of R&D expenditure, and 4.1% of researchers, it accounts for 9.5% of downloads, 11.6% of citations and 15.9% of the world’s most highly-cited articles and has overtaken the United States to rank 1^st by field-weighted citation impact (an indicator of research quality).

Does #ge2015 have an impact on funding?

In the run up to the upcoming UK elections, whilst “innovation” is touted often as something candidates and parties support, research funding doesn’t feature as a hot button issue, and this is possibly a reflection of the lack of importance voters place on it. Despite working in the field and specialising as a journalist covering research funding, Adam isn’t offended by the lack of interest. He believes there is a much larger problem that extends beyond the topic of science funding.

“I’m not upset that the general public don’t take a big interest in science funding. I do think that there are more fundamental and basic needs in society that people aren’t taking an interest in either, and if I’d want people to take an interest in something it would be those things. Science funding is really important, but there are  more urgent issues and I think there is just too much political apathy in general.”

For more insights into research funding from science journalists, check out this Mo’money post. 

Ebola is changing how vaccines are funded

The road for an Ebola vaccine is mapped out

The Wellcome Trust, in collaboration with the Centre for Infectious Disease Research and Policy (CIDRAP) at the University of Minnesota, last month published an Ebola vaccine road map report.

The document broadly describes the 14 stages of vaccine development, including funding, clinical trial design, and manufacturing. It goes on to lay out the ground rules for vaccine development for this Ebola outbreak, future Ebola outbreaks, and any other future infectious disease outbreak too.

Mike Turner, head of the infection and immunobiology department at The Wellcome Trust summed up the aim of the road map: “we’ve done a pretty good job in this Ebola outbreak of speeding up vaccine development, which many people said would not be achievable. But what we’re really about in this road map is saying ‘we’ve done well, but this is how we can do better’. We learn from this epidemic and the response to it so that next time there is any epidemic of any acute nasty infectious disease, we can respond even faster still.”

In essence, the report highlights that the established commercial model for vaccine development isn’t working, and alternative funding and production models for developing all types of vaccines are now in motion – all because of this Ebola outbreak.

It could have taken years

Vaccine development is a process that would normally take years, says Turner, but has been condensed to 6 months because of the Ebola outbreak, without cutting corners or compromising on ethics or safety.

In July 2014, Jeremy Farrar, Peter Piot and David Heymann together published an article about developing a vaccine for Ebola in The Wall Street Journal. It was this discussion, says Heymann, which started the ball rolling for this Ebola vaccine road map. In the article, they said:

“medical agencies in rich counties affected by Ebola would begin discussions with companies and labs developing [the vaccines] and then make rapid decisions about which of them might be appropriate for compassionate use. The African countries where the current outbreaks of Ebola are occurring should have the same opportunity.”

This road map has brought together The Wellcome Trust, CIDRAP and a panel of 26 experts, some from Nigeria, Mali, Ghana and The Gambia for example, to outline the future of vaccine production and funding possibilities.

However, given what Farrar, Piot and Heymann wrote about the importance of involving Africans in Ebola vaccine decisions back in July, is the involvement of a handful of African scientists and researchers in this roadmap enough? Especially since this virus outbreak is ravaging through West Africa, not western countries? Should the roadmap include specifics about involving African researchers and scientists in an Ebola vaccine development? This isn’t mentioned in the road map proposal.

Can African scientists get funding easily?

Kissaou TChedre, a biomedical researcher with The Academy of African Sciences, feels that African scientists are doing important research into Ebola, just not in Africa. He described the difficulties they have an in accessing funding opportunities, high tech laboratories and open access research whilst in their home countries. “In Africa due to the lack of resources, research almost does not exist,” he said. “That is why African countries should focus on investing in research and development facilities. To take advantage of these experienced Africa diaspora scientists, world class research facilities must be built in Africa to attract them.” He concluded, “there are very successful African scientists across the world in developed countries. They focus their efforts on projects of their host countries. Since most of African countries do not care about investing in developing world-class research centers in Africa, there is no interest of these scientists to go back to Africa to help.”

Can public and private sectors work together?

Another area that the road map barely expands on is that of private public monetary partnerships. Anne Roemer-Mahler, from the University of Sussex has extensive knowledge of private public partnerships in health funding.

“There is a growing awareness that we need alternative models of vaccine development which are based on public sector investment,” she said.

“But no-one seems to know, or developed the magic formula yet [for how it should look].” The report could lack this level of detail, simply because it is unclear still how this relationship between public and private investment will play out.

Phase I trials for two Ebola vaccines are finished, with a third trial due to finish next month. In Guinea and Liberia, phase II trials are about to start, which are the final stages of testing. If all goes well, an Ebola vaccine will be ready for the next potential outbreak, but is unlikely to curb the flow of cases in this particular outbreak.