Allan Border's desperate plea to PM
Allan Border has joined Parkinson’s Australia chief executive Olivia Nassaris in a plea for the Federal Government to provide more funding and research into the condition.
The 68-year-old cricket legend is one of over 150,000 Australians living with Parkinson’s, after being diagnosed with the neurodegenerative disorder back in 2016.
A new report from the organisation revealed that there are 19,500 new cases every year, with one Australian diagnosed with the condition every 27 minutes.
“A lot of people know the disease but they don’t know the impact that it has — 150,000 people in Australia have the disease, it does present in different ways,” Border said.
“When I was told I was suffering, my first image was of (boxer) Muhammad Ali and the Olympic torch, I just thought people suffered from a tremor.
“But there’s about 100,000 different ways of it presenting.”
Border joined the Parkinson’s Australia chief executive on April 11 to raise awareness for World Parkinson’s Day.
Nassaris estimated that the number of Australians impacted by Parkinson’s would almost triple by 2050.
“At the moment we don’t have a cause or cure, so it is frightening that a disease like this is going to almost triple in numbers,” she said.
Responding to the cricketer’s plea, the Prime Minister described Border as a “great Australian” and hinted at a potential boost to government support in providing more resources into the condition.
“Our heart goes out to him,” the PM said on Thursday.
“I will have a word with the Health Minister about what more we can do. We have contributed over $100m to research into Parkinson’s.
“There’s also a pilot program for nurses about people suffering from Parkinson’s at the moment. There’s some $6.5m being used for that pilot program. We want to wait and see what the assessment of that is.”
Images: Getty