COVID-19 & MS data sharing : for MS organisations and advocates

As the COVID-19 pandemic reaches more countries, people with MS are looking to MS organisations for advice on their risks. We urgently need information on how different disease-modifying therapies for MS affect a person’s risk of developing severe COVID-19 symptoms.

We are calling on MS organisations to support the COVID-19 and MS global data sharing initiative by:

• Encouraging people with MS to report to a COVID-19 patient data initiative, even if they do not think they have contracted the virus. We need data on as many people with MS as possible, not just those who have tested positive, have had severe symptoms or have been in hospital.  The existing COVID-19 data initiatives for people with MS can be found here
• Encouraging the MS neurologists and clinicians in your networks to start reporting on the COVID-19 status of their patients with MS. This can be done through one of the existing COVID-19 data initiatives
• Spread the word about the global data sharing initiative so we can encourage widespread collaborative data collection and data sharing in all areas of the world

Tell me more

To find out more about how the initiative works, how you can take part and how your data will help us find answers faster, watch the video below with Clare Walton (MSIF) and Liesbet Peeters (MS Data Alliance).

You can also download more information on the global data sharing initiative.