Today Shake Up Founder, Clyde Campbell and CEO, Ben Young attended Parliament House with members of the Parkinson’s community, MPs and Senators for the launch of the Parkinson’s Australia Action Framework, Make Parkinson’s a Priority.
Make Parkinson’s a Priority is a campaign led by Parkinson’s Australia that asks the Government to Make Parkinson’s a Priority through:
- Recognition of Parkinson’s as a National Health Priority Area;
- Investment in better care and support for people living with Parkinson’s through equitable access to Parkinson’s Nurse Specialists and equitable access to medications and therapies;
- Investment and capacity building in Parkinson’s research; and,
- Investment in upskilling the workforce to enable timely diagnosis, better care and support of people living with Parkinson’s.
Given our focus on finding better treatments and ultimately a cure for Parkinson’s we are extremely passionate about this campaign and in particular the call for greater investment in research.
As Australia’s largest non-government funder of Parkinson’s research ($1.6M committed since start of 15/16 FY) Shake It Up and The Michael J. Fox Foundation see firsthand the need to increase the volume of funding directed towards the brilliant Parkinson’s researchers we have in Australia and the enormous opportunities that such an increase would present.
Through our partnership with The Michael J. Fox Foundation we are able to take a worldwide view of Parkinson’s research and can confidently say that some of the brightest minds in this field are right here on our shores. This presents a remarkable opportunity for Australia to play a pivotal role in the quest for new treatments and ultimately a cure.
As a leader in strategic Parkinson’s research funding in Australia, we will remain focussed on our task and have set ourselves an ambitious target of raising an additional $1M for research by the end of 2016. However, we want the Federal Government to come on that journey with us. We are asking the Government to Make Parkinson’s a Priority by increasing the annual investment in Parkinson’s research to $20M.
