Thanks.
Honourable Chair, honourable members of the subcommittee on neurological disease, my name is Weihong Song. I am the Canada research chair in Alzheimer's disease, and a Jack Brown and Family professor at UBC.
It's my great honour to meet with you today to discuss the developments in research related to Alzheimer's disease and to present my suggestions and recommendations related to the federal role in supporting Alzheimer's disease research.
Alzheimer's disease is the most common neurodegenerative disorder leading to dementia. It costs Canadians $15 billion a year right now and it is estimated to be $153 billion by 2038. Every 71 seconds someone develops Alzheimer's. One in eleven Canadians over the age of 65 currently has Alzheimer's disease or a related dementia. It is the fourth-leading cause of death for people aged 65 and over.
This is a heartbreaking illness and burdens many families. One in six Canadians has someone with Alzheimer's disease in their family. My own family, actually, has been affected by this disease too. My father died from Alzheimer's disease seven years ago and now my mother suffers from stroke and dementia.
As you can see, this has affected me deeply, not only as a clinician and basic researcher professionally but also personally as a son of Alzheimer patients, to experience what is it like to be someone whose family is affected by it.
Canada has many outstanding world-leading Alzheimer research scientists and has an excellent track record in Alzheimer research. Canadian researchers made great contributions in discovering novel genes and their mutations causing Alzheimer's disease, in establishing unique animal model systems, in studying early diagnosis biomarkers and neuro-imaging, as well as in leading Alzheimer disease drug trails and development.
My own interest in Alzheimer's disease began 20 years ago ,when I was a chief psychiatrist in China and published my first Alzheimer research paper reporting clinical analysis of the disease. Previously, at Harvard Medical School, we discovered a role of gene mutations in the familial Alzheimer's disease.
Since I moved to UBC nine years ago, my laboratory at UBC has become one of the world's leading Alzheimer research labs. We recently discovered how low oxygen supply to brains, such as in stroke and other cerebral vascular diseases, leads to Alzheimer's disease development. Our pre-clinical study showed that an anti-epileptic drug, VPA, could prevent and treat Alzheimer's disease.
Researchers have made great strides for the past 25 years; however, at present there is no effective way to prevent and cure this disease. The major reason for this is that we do not know the real causes for the majority of the Alzheimer's disease patients, and the pathological mechanism leading to the disease remains elusive. Therefore, we have not had a good tool for early diagnosis and valid targets yet to be further uncovered for drug development.
Although there are many breakthroughs, the Alzheimer research in Canada is extremely underfunded by the federal government. The benefits of federal funding in Alzheimer's research are extraordinary. By delaying the onset of the disease by two years, we will reduce the cumulative costs by a quarter—$219 billion—by the year 2038. By delaying the onset of the disease by five years, we will reduce the cost by half—almost $400 billion over the next 30 years.
The need for federal action is urgent. Following are my suggestions and recommendations.
First, increase the federal funding for Alzheimer's disease targeted for clinical and basic research. It is especially critical to increase funding to basic studies on the risk factors and causes, underlying mechanisms, biomarkers identification and validation, and novel drug target discovery. My recommendation is for $50 million per year for the initial five years, for open competitions through the CIHR.
Second is federal support to build three to five research centres of excellence on Alzheimer's disease across Canada. The centres will serve as a basis for cutting-edge research and new knowledge generation, and a training base for graduate students and post-doctoral fellows, as well as recruiting and retaining the best scientists working on Alzheimer's disease in Canada. My recommendation is for $3 million to $5 million per year for an initial five years for each centre.
Third, increase federal support for awareness, knowledge translation, and patient care through national and local Alzheimer societies and organizations. Such supports should also be accessible in multiple languages and by minority ethnic groups.
Fourth is federal support for private donations on Alzheimer's disease. Such support will greatly encourage philanthropic efforts and partnership of the private and business sectors. My recommendation is to have matching funds available to the institutions and organizations receiving private donations that focus on Alzheimer's disease research.
My coming to Canada and my lab's success in Alzheimer's research can be greatly attributed to generous donations from the Jack Brown family and the David Townsend family. They have donated close to $10 million to me for UBC. The donations have allowed me to establish a state-of-the-art research lab at UBC with cutting-edge techniques and the ability to recruit talented peoples worldwide for the past nine years and have made significant impacts on our research to identify a novel molecular mechanism leading to this disease and a possible new treatment for Alzheimer's disease.
My final recommendation concerns federal support of international partnerships and collaboration on Alzheimer's disease research. International collaborations will greatly enhance our research ability with complementary resources and expertise from other countries. My recommendation is to support a joint Canada-China centre for translational medical research in Down syndrome and Alzheimer's disease. The centre will be a network of research teams of clinician scientists and investigators, based in Vancouver and Chongqing with team members from other top institutions across Canada and China. The international collaboration centre will focus on translational research and have joint quality personnel training, early diagnosis markers, drug development, health policy, and clinical service. It has received strong support from UBC, Chongqing Medical University, and the Townsend family donations.
My recommendation is for $5 million per year for five years for the partnership.
Thank you very much, respectfully.