Researchers in the United Kingdom are set to gain a major new boost after the Medical Research Council, in partnership with the British Heart Foundation, announced £72 million of funding for the UK Obesity Research Institute.
The new institute is designed to transform understanding of obesity, its links to serious illness and the development of better approaches to prevention and treatment. According to UKRI, the investment will support research into the origins, prevention, treatment and health consequences of obesity, with a particular focus on how the condition affects some people and not others.
Why the new institute matters
The announcement comes as obesity continues to place a growing burden on individuals, healthcare services and the economy. UKRI said that in England alone there were 8,716 hospital admissions directly attributable to obesity in 2022 to 2023, up 13% from the previous year, while obesity was a factor in more than 1.2 million hospital admissions during the same period.
Professor Patrick Chinnery, MRC Executive Chair, said obesity-related illness costs the NHS £6 billion annually and described obesity as a complex biological condition involving genetics, hormones, the brain, metabolism, behaviour and the environment. He said the new institute would bring together world-leading expertise to better understand the mechanistic causes of obesity and how more effective prevention and treatment strategies can be developed.
Research aimed at real-world impact
UK-ORI will combine biomedical science, medicine and technology, and it will also use experimental medicine to test biological mechanisms in humans. UKRI said the institute’s wider ambition is to accelerate the translation of research discoveries into real-world health benefits and strengthen links between academia, industry and healthcare.
The British Heart Foundation’s Professor Bryan Williams said obesity is a leading risk factor for cardiovascular disease and is linked to tens of thousands of heart attacks and strokes every year in the UK. He said the partnership will help improve understanding of how obesity affects national health and speed the development of new ways to prevent and treat it.
Links to other serious diseases
UKRI said obesity is associated with a range of major conditions, including type 2 diabetes, heart disease, strokes, steatotic liver disease, gallbladder disease, cancer, obstructive sleep apnea, osteoarthritis, chronic kidney disease and idiopathic intracranial hypertension. The institute is expected to examine these pathways in detail as part of its broader scientific programme.
The new funding also reflects a growing focus on personalised, biology-based approaches to one of the UK’s most significant public health challenges. By bringing together researchers across disciplines, the UK Obesity Research Institute is intended to support discoveries that could move more quickly from the laboratory to patients.
More details are available from UKRI’s announcement on the MRC news page and the full institute launch story. UKRI MRC News
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