Awareness push for dementia
pharmafile | March 3, 2010 | News story | | dementia, disease awareness campaigns
The government’s offensive on dementia has continued with a new awareness campaign called Living Well, which aims to break down the stigma surrounding the disease.
It has been launched on the back of findings from a MORI poll which found one in three people admit to avoiding people with dementia.
More than half of respondents also say they don’t know how to help people with the various forms of the condition.
“Dementia doesn’t discriminate and neither should we,” said care services minister Phil Hope. “Our research shows that too often people fear dementia and this causes them to avoid people with the condition, making them feel isolated and stigmatised.”
However, 81% of MORI respondents agreed people with dementia can still take part in normal activities – something that the new campaign aims to emphasise.
It shows real sufferers saying: “I have dementia – I also have a life” in a bid to demonstrate things everyone can do to help people live well.
The campaign will run on TV, radio, online and in print across England and Hope insists it does not downplay people’s experiences.
“We want to show that, with the right support, people can live well with the condition and continue to do the things they enjoy for a number of years following diagnosis,” he insists.
In the MORI research 32% of people admitted: “I would find it difficult to spend much time with someone who has dementia”, while 53% said they do not know enough about dementia to help someone who has it.
The Department of Health has identified dementia as a major drain on public money as well as a source of misery for many: one in three people over 65 will die with a form of the condition, which costs the economy £17 billion a year.
The newly-appointed national clinical director for dementia Alistair Burns said: “Despite the fact that most people will be touched by dementia at some point in their lives, understanding of the condition, and how it is managed, is poor.”
The campaign asks people to find out more, focusing on what dementia sufferers can do, rather than on what they cannot.
It also urges them to be good listeners and to do something for a sufferer, such as running an errand.
Just last week the government announced plans to boost access to research funding for the development of dementia treatments.
• More information on the implementation of the national dementia strategy can be found here.
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