Cancer Research UK has committed funding of £190 million over the next five years for its network of 13 UK Centres, which aim to accelerate the pathway for getting cutting edge discoveries from the laboratory to patients.
It was also revealed that the charity and the Department of Health are streaming £36 million over five years into 18 Experimental Cancer Medicine Centres (ECMCs) for adult patients and also a network of Centres for children.
These centres area hubs where promising cancer treatments – including small molecule drugs, surgery, immunotherapy, and vaccines – are safely tested for the first time in patients.
The investment – the largest ever made into the Centres by CR UK – is designed to pull together “world class research and medical expertise” to help fuel progress in research and support clinical trials, and will also help train the next generation of cancer researchers, the charity noted.
“We want to lead the world in fighting cancer. The work of Experimental Cancer Medicine Centres is crucial in this fight. This next phase of funding from the National Institute for Health Research will help our world-leading researchers to continue to make new discoveries,” said Nicola Blackwood, minister for public health and innovation.
“I hope this funding will ultimately lead to more timely, life-saving treatments for patients.”
“This is an exciting time for cancer research. Emerging treatments like immunotherapy are radically changing the field, we are increasingly able to tailor more treatments to individual patients, and advances in technology mean we can collect and share more research data than ever before,” said Sir Harpal Kumar, CR UK’s chief executive.
“Cancer Research UK’s projections are that we will reach more than 500,000 new diagnoses of cancer a year in the UK by 2035. By that time, our goal is that three in four people will survive their cancer. Funding these Centres is one of the charity’s most important strategic priorities and one which will help us reach this ambition”.
