David Willetts, Minister of State (Universities and Science), Business, Innovation and Skills and Conservative MP for Havant answered a written question from Ian Swales, Liberal Democrat MP for Redcar about spending on M.E. research on 2 December 2010 in the UK Parliament.
Ian Swales: To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills what estimate he has made of expenditure from the public purse on biomedical research relating to myalgic encephalomyelitis in each of the last 10 years.
Mr Willetts: The Medical Research Council is one of the main agencies through which the Government support medical and clinical research. The MRC is an independent body which receives its grant in aid from the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills. The selection of projects for funding by MRC is determined through peer review.
"Biomedical" is not a category the MRC would normally use to classify research in its portfolio. In the last 10 years, MRC expenditure on research relating to CFS/ME was as follows:
| Year | Amount |
| 2000/01 | 0 |
| 2001/02 | 0 |
| 2002/03 | 0 |
| 2003/04 | 141,000 |
| 2004/05 | 559,000 |
| 2005/06 | 752,000 |
| 2006/07 | 800,000 |
| 2007/08 | 1,350,000 |
| 2008/09 | 728,000 |
| 2009/10 | 109,000 |
Projects included within these figures are as follows:
Professor R K Morriss, university of Liverpool-Exploratory RCT of training general practitioners to manage patients with persistent medically unexplained symptoms (MUS).
Professor P White, Queen Mary College, London-The PACE trial; A RCT of CBT, graded exercise, adaptive pacing and usual medical care for the chronic fatigue syndrome.
Dr A Wearden, university of Manchester-Randomised controlled trial of nurse-led self-help treatment for primary care patients with chronic fatigue syndrome.
Dr K Bhui, Queen Mary College, London-Chronic Fatigue and Ethnicity.
Professor F H Creed, university of Manchester-The feasibility of a population-based study of CFS, IBS and CWP.
Dr C Clark, Queen Mary College, London-General and specific risk markers and preventive factors for chronic fatigue and irritable bowel syndromes.
Further information about most of these projects can be found on the MRC's online research portfolio at:
http://www.mrc.ac.uk/ResearchPortfolio/index.htm
Read the Hansard entry or view the They Work For You entry.
