Today, Senator Jim Abeler (Anoka) held a press conference to introduce a budget increase for the Spinal Cord Injury and Traumatic Brain Injury Research Grant (SCI and TBI) Program. This legislation seeks to increase the budget for this grant program to $5 million per year, in an effort to expand the program’s reach to more people living with paralysis.

In 2017, with funding from private donors, Mayo Clinic became the first medical center in the world to validate paralysis recovery results using a spinal neuromodulation treatment, and the first patient in that clinical trial walked independently for more than 100 yards. Funding for this research came in two parts: half from the state’s SCI and TBI research grant program, and the other half came from private donors. At the end of last month, Governor Walz released his budget, which included a recommendation for eliminating the funding for this program.

“These individuals with spinal cord injuries and brain injuries deserve hope and they deserve the opportunity. And I, amongst others, am going to fight for them,” Senator Abeler said.