How footy legend Neale Daniher’s record funding pool will be distributed, to find a MND cure

Neale Daniher’s FightMND charity will commit a record $20.2m to help find a cure for the devastating motor neurone disease that is slowly killing the football legend and other Australians.

Neale Daniher’s FightMND charity will commit a record $20.2 million for Motor Neurone Disease research and care initiatives in a move hoped to find a cure for the cruel condition.

The national charity will on Friday announce an unprecedented pool of funding for researchers around Australia and the world to fast-track vital research efforts.

Melbourne and Monash Universities, the Florey Institute and Barwon Health are among leading Victorian medical leaders to share the funding – raised from fundraisers such as Big Freeze at the ‘G’.

Of the more than $20 million, FightMND will this year commit more about $16.5m to research, including support of clinical trials, drug development projects, research fellowships, PhD scholarships and major research.

Melbourne University Associate Professor Peter Crouch, who will run a two-year trial to see if a new treatment for brain cancer can slow MND progression, said the funding would “change the landscape’’.

Neale Daniher walks through a guard of honour before the round 13 AFL match between Melbourne and Collingwood at the MCG on June 12. Picture: Michael Klein.

MND may have robbed Daniher of his voice and much of his mobility, but it hasn’t taken his fight to find a cure. Picture: Mark Stewart

“It basically means that we can keep doing the research that we need to do,’’ he said.

“We know what we need to do, we know how to do it, by getting the funding now it means we’ve got the opportunity to do the work.’’

FIGHT MND cure, research and programs director Bec Sheean said the charity’s biggest cash injection yet was a commitment to research finding a cure and reward for everyone who had donated funds or bought a Big Freeze beanie.

“This is our biggest year yet for investment and what it means is that for year after year we’re able to grow that research community,’’ she said.

“We’re able to support really vital research to progress, to keep that going in the fight against Motor Neurone Disease.’’

Fight MND will commit about $3.6 million into care support projects for Australians living with and affected by the disease, including equipment, technology and at home aid.

MND sufferer Adena Savva said it helped her young family “feel really hopeful, hopeful that one day we will find a cure for Motor Neurone Disease.

“It’s definitely important [to have that hope] for everyone out there that has this disease, and all our friends and family and the communities around us, it is really important,’’ she said.