The Latest Breaking News from Medical Research Future Fund

Should you be denied life insurance or have to pay extra if you have a genetic risk for certain diseases? Should insurance companies even have access to your genetic data in the first place? This is known as “genetic discrimination”, a practice already banned in some countries, including Canada.

Australia is now into its next COVID wave. We’ve seen hints of this for a while. Case numbers and indicators of severe disease began rising in Victoria in August. But it has taken several months for a consistent pattern to emerge across Australia.

Every year, more than 20,000 Australians – mostly women – are diagnosed with breast cancer. If you’re one of them or know someone who is, the great news is that 92 out of every 100 women will survive for five years or more after their diagnosis.

A recent detailed analysis of prescribing trends for ADHD medications in Australia found prescriptions for ADHD medications doubled from 2013 to 2020. While this is clearly an important finding, it needs to be considered within the context of overall rates of prescribing, the recommendations of guidelines and, importantly, the prevalence…

Many parents will understand the frustration of coming home from work to find their teens slumped on the couch with their eyes glued to their phones or the TV.

Children, even some who are too young for school, know you can’t make a baby without sperm and an egg. But a team of researchers in Israel have called into question the basics of what we teach children about the birds and the bees, and created a mouse embryo using…

COVID lockdowns and home schooling seemed never-ending for a lot of families. But there were some silver linings.

Most health research in Australia is funded by the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC), which distributes around $800 million each year through competitive grant schemes. An additional $650 million a year is funded via the Medical Research Future Fund, but this focuses more on big-picture “missions” than researcher-initiated…

Around 25,000 people visit hospital emergency departments across Australia every day. Many of them are reporting waiting for hours to be seen. Some give up and leave, only to have their condition deteriorate.