The head of the new Cardiac and Respiratory Foundation wants whoever's next in government to fund lung cancer screening.

Four cardiac and respiratory charities - the Asthma and Respiratory Foundation, The Heart of Aotearoa, the Lung Foundation, and the Bronchiectasis Foundation - have merged to have a single voice for heart and lung health challenges.

Chief executive Letitia Harding said it made more sense for them to be one organisation.

"This is something we have brought together because we've been hearing from health professionals but also patients and we've had a lot of experience in this space bringing those four issues [we represent] together.

"Considering New Zealand has one of the highest charity per population rates in the world, we've got over 29,000 charities, from that perspective it actually does make sense for our donors."

She said one of the foundation's main priorities would be advocating for a nationally funded lung cancer screening programme.

"We're hoping it's in the budget for next year and that it gets rolled out. There's a lot of work that has been done by the Lung Foundation, which of course we've absorbed it all.

"The health professionals and the researchers in this space have been saying for many years it's a no-brainer that we need to be looking at lung cancer screening and targeted screening, not blanket screening because obviously it's very expensive."

She said their other immediate focus would be getting the RSV publicly funded.

The foundation will be officially opened by Minister of Health Simeon at a launch event in Auckland on Thursday.