South Australia's brand new state-of-the-art Royal Adelaide Hospital has not been designed to accommodate clinical trials. Will South Australians now miss out?

It is a rare thing that a cure can be found for a chronic disease. Yet such a thing did happen recently with the revolution in treatments for hepatitis C.

The new Direct-Acting Antiviral medicines could cure over 90 per cent of those treated, in 8 to 24 weeks with minimal side effects. Compare this to previous treatment regimens of 24 to 48 weeks, often with severe side effects, and cure rates of only 50 to 80 per cent.

Such breakthroughs would not have been possible without concerted, meticulous research and coordinated clinical trials around the world. So it is disappointing to hear (see media report and AMA article) that South Australia’s brand new state-of-the-art Royal Adelaide Hospital, will have no room for clinical trials.