Meet our new Medical Advisor, Dr David Strain
July 01, 2021
We’re excited to announce the appointment of Dr David Strain as our Medical Advisor.
Dr Strain brings a wealth of clinical and academic experience to our charity, as Senior Clinical Lecturer at the University of Exeter Medical School and as a consultant to the Devon M.E./CFS specialist service. He leads the British Medical Association’s Covid-19 response team and has repeatedly drawn parallels between Long Covid and M.E./CFS, calling for research to benefit all post-viral illnesses.
He said, “I’m excited to be joining Action for M.E. as their medical adviser and support their great work improving the lives of children and adults with M.E. This disease continues to be misunderstood by some in the medical community. By working with Action for M.E. I will continue to address the stigma and misinformation that exists and offer advice and guidance to enhance their work.”
Our CEO Sonya Chowdhury said, “Dr Strain brings considerable experience and insight to the charity. As a physician, he has supported people with M.E. and Long Covid and has a good understanding of both health and research, which will strengthen our work and the support we provide to people with M.E. His appointment is an incredibly positive step and I hope the community will join me in welcoming him to the role.”
You might recognise Dr Strain from our second Learn about M.E. podcast, published in May, or the BBC Horizon long Covid special from February, where he said,
“If we develop a treatment for Long Covid that can be carried over, we can start treating people who’ve had M.E./CFS for the last twenty years and have been left with what is a life-changing physical illness that they’ve struggled to even have accepted as a disease in its own right.”
His appointment follows the retirement of Dr Gregor Purdie earlier this year and Professor Julia Newton recently standing down from the jointly-held role after serving a six-year tenure. We are hugely grateful to both of them for the time, insight and experience that they have shared with us and those we serve.
