Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how much the Government has spent on research into age-related macular degeneration in each year since 2010.

Spend on research funded directly by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) is categorised by Health Research Classification System (HRCS) categories including ‘eye’. There are no HRCS health sub-categories, such as for age-related macular degeneration (AMD).

Investment in eye-related research by the NIHR has risen from £7.1 million in 2010/11 to £18.5 million in 2014/15 (the latest available figure).

As a major part of its investment in this field, the NIHR has recently awarded £19 million over five years from April 2017 to the NIHR biomedical research centre at Moorfields Eye Hospital NHS Foundation Trust and University College London. This will include research on AMD.

Current investment in AMD research through NIHR programmes includes:

- a £2.2 million trial of stereotactic radiotherapy for wet AMD;

- a £2.2 million study of early detection of neo-vascular AMD; and

- a £0.9 million study of the efficacy of the telescopic mirror implant for AMD.