Health is a vital factor in our wellbeing. There is perhaps no other area of research where the public benefits so directly from new findings and innovations as in health research. The Federal Government is providing strategic and substantive impetus for this with the Health Research Framework Programme.
Major widespread diseases, such as cancer, cardiovascular diseases, diabetes, mental disorders and neurodegenerative diseases, represent major challenges, as do the long-term consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic. Demographic change is exacerbating the situation, as more people fall ill in old age and are more likely to need social care. Research to improve healthcare – from prevention and screening, to diagnosis and treatment, to follow-up care and social care – is therefore an important objective for the Federal Government. The Federal Government is also making the issue of women’s health and gender-sensitive medicine a priority in order to address the need for research in this area.
Germany’s internationally renowned medical schools play a pivotal role in health research; their unique strength comes from linking clinical research and high standards of patient care. They have close links and partnerships that span various specialties and sites. Examples include the German Centers for Health Research (DZG) and the Network of University Medicine (NUM), whose work ensures that new research findings are rapidly implemented in medical practice. Within the DZG, medical schools work together with non-university research institutions to address the big challenges in tackling major widespread diseases. Data-driven and AI-based medicine is also supported by data networking and the development and expansion of data infrastructures, which provide legal certainty for the use of healthcare data by the scientific community. This is another way in which the Federal Government is strengthening health research.
There is a close connection between the health of people, animals and their environment: the One Health approach emphasises the need for a holistic perspective. It makes clear that solutions to health issues require more interdisciplinary research approaches at regional, national and international level; they can no longer be developed by disciplines acting in isolation. One Health also offers important starting points for researching global health: alongside particularly urgent challenges, such as potential pandemics, infectious diseases and the rise in antimicrobial resistance (AMR), there is a growing focus on environmental factors such as climate change or pollution levels, because they have a significant impact on the emergence and spread of diseases.
Public health research also looks at infectious and non-communicable diseases. It analyses the causes of disease, assesses measures relating to health promotion, prevention and improvements to healthcare, and takes social and environmental factors into account in this context, such as personal circumstances, living environment or socio-economic status.
More detailed information can be found in Chapter 5 of the Federal Report (in German).