The UK and the EU: our work to support researchers and people affected by cancer

Cancer Research UK is working to support UK-EU research collaboration – image of UK and EU flags tied together at the top

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To request a meeting or further information about our work please contact the Public Affairs team.

Health and science are global. Collaboration between the UK and other countries enables the discoveries that benefit everyone. As the world’s largest independent funder of cancer research, we remain committed to the collective effort in beating cancer. We all win when science wins. It’s a cause that unites people across the world.

Cancer Grand Challenges: How we’re uniting the world’s brightest minds against cancer’s toughest challenges

That’s why we worked hard to inform the Brexit negotiations, to represent the interests of our researchers and people with cancer. We’ve been following progress closely ever since. We were delighted when the UK and EU agreed that the UK would associate to Horizon Europe from 1 January 2024. But we feel the UK-EU relationship should do more for people affected by cancer. We’ll continue to work hard to ensure cancer patients in the UK and across the EU are prioritised in talks about the future relationship.

What people affected by cancer need from the new UK-EU relationship

During 2023, we asked people affected by cancer and our scientific community what they need from the future UK-EU relationship. We’ll publish the results in 2024 and share them with other health and research organisations. We will speak to the UK Government and EU institutions on behalf of our communities to make sure the voices of our communities are heard.

In 2020, we published a short report on our priorities ahead of the “Brexit deal”. So far, we’ve found our main priorities haven’t changed very much since then. See more in our report (link is external). We still want to make sure that patients can access the latest treatments as quickly as possible (including through clinical trials), that scientists can collaborate easily, and that the UK continues to be a desirable destination for world-leading researchers.

So we must continue to explore how the new UK-EU relationship can best work for people affected by cancer and researchers, and be as ambitious as possible. We can demonstrate the impact of changes in areas where our communities must continue to adapt. And we can show the UK Government and the EU what is most important to people affected by cancer and the scientists who are working so hard to bring families better and kinder treatments.

Scientists have greater impact when they collaborate globally.

A 2017 report funded by eight leading UK medical research funders and charities identified some of the main ways in which UK research contributes to medical progress. It highlighted the benefit this has delivered for EU science, and ultimately how this has improved the health of patients across the EU.

See more about the impact of collaboration: The value of UK medical research to EU science and health

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Last reviewed

22 November 2023