UK Science Minister Speech

2025 WDC Summit London Opening Address: Lord Patrick Vallance
 

Thank you very much. I really agree with that last point that Lenny made, that it is these advances in therapeutics that suddenly change the whole of clinical practice and opportunities for patients. It's amazing that we are at that point now with potentially disease-modifying treatments being used right the way across the system and the outcome for patients potentially changing as well as clinical practice.

I'm delighted to open this World Dementia Council Summit today. This is clearly a global issue, and that's why this summit and actually all of you and the partnerships that are represented in this room are so very important.

Let me start with the UK. In the UK alone, something like one million people are predicted to be living with dementia by the end of this year, and 1.6 million by 2040. And it's already listed as the leading cause of death in the UK.

This growth in dementia means that by 2040, there'll be something like nearly seven million additional primary care health contacts associated with dementia, requiring 1.7 million more hours of primary care time. This is a massive problem for individuals, it's a massive problem for healthcare systems and society that needs to be tackled, and what I've said is of course, replicated right the way around the world. 

The UK is deeply committed to research and development. And as of the 1st of January in 2024, there are 164 trials for Alzheimer's. That's extraordinary. If you go back two decades, there were maybe one. 164 clinical trials of which 96 are disease modifying therapies. What we do know is that we need to do much more as these come through to work out the commercialisation of research and to ensure that these new treatments reach patients. And this isn't a challenge that can be addressed individually. We need to embrace the history of collaboration between public and private sector and double down on it. So that universities continue to discover and incubate great science and research institutes like this one, here at the Crick, does exactly that. And that research can be spun out into new companies. That these companies can raise capital. That we can get trials and investing going as a result of that. And that we're laser-focused on getting those innovations to patients, whether that's from small companies or big companies, and indeed all of the other things, the diagnostics and everything else that you know about.

The UK government is currently investing record amounts into dementia research and there are some unique capabilities. I've been around long enough and was in the system for long enough to have been involved in some of these. As I said to a meeting just before this one, I don't want to be involved in things that don't work. And so I'm rather keen that things like the UK Dementia Research Institute, which I was involved in right at the beginning, through to collaborations such as the Dementia Discovery Fund, which has now started 20 companies, nine of them based in the UK, which are doing the sorts of research that will lead. And the sorts of products coming through will lead to a change. A key example of partnership is of course the government's Dame Barbara Windsor Dementia Goals Programme, which puts £120 million of government funding committed to date. It aims to speed up the development of new treatments for dementia and neurodegenerative conditions in partnership, and it's very important, this is in partnership with industry, academia, patients of course, and in this country the NHS. And I'm delighted to say today that that programme is investing two million pounds, not a huge sum of money but a very important sum of money, into a digital cognitive assessment as a bolt-on to the readout study. That matters because enabling a digital cognitive assessment component to be added to blood-based biomarkers will have a big impact. Combining those tests with a quick and easy digital test of patients' cognitive functions could make for more accurate diagnosis of dementia across a much broader range of people. And we're very pleased to be able to do this in partnership alongside the Davos Alzheimer's Collaboration and looking forward to working with existing teams to make sure that that progresses. And I know many people involved in that are here in the room today.

I do want to recognize one thing that I think is important, which is dementia science is in a sense redundant if we're unable bring the benefits to patients. And how to do this is a focus for the teams leading the development of this country's 10-year health plan and the life sciences sector plan. This is going to include a series of policy interventions which impact on both health and on the economy with the objective of enhancing the UK's research landscape by maximizing the impact on healthcare and providing secure access to high quality data sets, positioning the UK as a leader in adopting innovation, cost effective technologies to improve patient outcomes within the NHS.

So this notion that at the very start, there may be a product, but ultimately this is about healthcare change. And by fostering innovation, it's the only way we end up with sustainable healthcare systems. And this, beyond all diseases, is the one that we must make sure we get right. We want to ensure that healthcare systems remain at the forefront of medical advances providing what we would all want, which is the best possible care for people. And I'll just end by saying what is happening here is really pivotally important. I guess almost everybody in this room has some personal connection in some way to dementia as well as their professional connection. That personal connection is going to be right the way throughout society and therefore there will rightly be a demand from society that something is done.

We're lucky because we are in the generation where this is going to change, and we can already see it changing and that's the big hope. And I think as we've just heard from the last speaker, hope is the thing that ultimately leads to change and leads to the opportunity to make sure that future generations get the benefits that we know research can deliver. So I hope you have a very successful conference.