President Obama recently released the FY 2015 budget, which shows similar funding for Alzheimer’s disease research and support services as the FY 2014 budget. The budget allocates $30.2 billion to the National Institutes of Health, with the National Institute on Aging, which funds the majority of Alzheimer’s research, receiving $1.17 billion. This is the same budget that was allocated in 2014. The Administration on Community Living, which implements Older American Act programs that support family caregivers, also received mostly level funding.
The budget requests a need for “innovative, high-risk high-reward research to help spur development of new therapeutics to treat diseases and disorders that affect millions of Americans.” The BRAIN (Brain Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies) initiative, created last year to map the brain in an attempt to better understand neurological disorders, will see a notable increase, with the budget being doubled to $200 million.
However, the budget does include proposed cuts, including $407 billion to Medicare, which would result in higher out-of-pocket costs for Medicare members. The Alzheimer’s Foundation of America (AFA) will continue to urge the President and Congress to increase funding for Alzheimer’s disease research and support services. In an open letter to the President, Charles J. Fuschillo, Jr., the chief executive officer of the Alzheimer’s Foundation of America (AFA), wrote, “We are thankful that the Administration and Congress have prioritized tackling Alzheimer’s disease and carrying out the goals of the historic ‘National Plan to Address Alzheimer’s Disease,’ which calls for a cure or effective treatment by 2025,” said Fuschillo. “This unprecedented public health crisis warrants an unprecedented investment. We are hopeful that the latest increase in funding will pave the way for greater funding in Alzheimer’s disease research and care in the next fiscal year and beyond that is more in line with investments in other chronic disease states.”
Resources: http://archive.constantcontact.com/fs153/1101917450872/archive/1116810365402.html
Alzheimer’s Foundation of America – March 13, 2014 – newsletter
Volume 7 Issue
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/alzheimers-foundation-america-urges-administration-203149204.html
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/federal-eye/wp/2014/03/04/national-institutes-of-health-budget-emphasizes-alzheimers-research/
