Collins helps secure increased research funds to fight Alzheimer’s in Senate bill

U.S. Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME), a senior member of the U.S. Senate Appropriations Committee and the founder and co-chair of the Congressional Task Force on Alzheimer’s disease, helped secure Senate passage of a $425 million increase for Alzheimer’s research.

Citing the additional funds as the nation’s largest such increase to date, Sen. Collins said the federal government’s total investment now tops
$2.3 billion for fiscal year (FY) 2019.

“We have made tremendous progress in recent years to boost funding for biomedical research, and this legislation builds on that momentum by providing the largest-ever increase for Alzheimer’s, exceeding our $2 billion goal,” the senator said on Sept. 4, referring to the amount that experts say is needed to prevent and treat the crippling disease by the year 2025.

“I am encouraged by the bipartisan commitment to spurring the development of a means of prevention and treatment for this terrible disease,” she said.

The Alzheimer’s research funding would be provided under the Departments of Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies Appropriations Bill for 2019, S. 3158, which a conference committee is working to reconcile before the bill heads to the president’s desk to be signed into law. S. 3158 was introduced on June 28 by U.S. Sen. Roy Blunt (R-MO).

The Senate-approved bill builds on significant increases in funding she has previously secured, including $414 million in FY 2018; $400 million in FY 2017; and $350 million FY 2016, according to the senator’s staff.

“I have long championed increased investments for Alzheimer’s, which hold great promise for putting an end to this disease that has a devastating effect on millions of Americans and their families,” said Collins.

For example, Sen. Collins in 2011 co-authored the bipartisan National Alzheimer’s Project Act (NAPA), which authorized the panel of experts who ultimately determined that $2 billion a year in research funding is needed to achieve the national goal of preventing and treating Alzheimer’s by the year 2025.