Pratchett stars posthumously in Alzheimer’s charity campaign
SIR Terry Pratchett is posthumously starring in a hardhitting TV advert campaign waging war on Alzheimer’s – the disease which he died from in March this year.
The author and several other famous faces, including Hollywood actor and charity ambassador Seth Rogen and James Nesbitt, joined forces for Alzheimer’s Research UK’s Fightback campaign.
Rogen, whose mother-inlaw is living with early-onset Alzheimer’s disease, said: “Alzheimer’s disease is a global challenge and it doesn’t respect ethnicity or wealth, and with a rapidly ageing global population, it’s one of our biggest threats. Alzheimer’s Research UK’s campaign is a bit of a wake-up call to the scale of the challenge, but also a call to arms for us to back research to beat it.
“We shouldn’t think of Alzheimer’s as different to other big diseases, at its root are brain cells dying and this is a physical process that scientists can put a stop to, given the resources to do the job. I hope this campaign gets folks talking about the disease and moves us towards a place where we really start to fight it, I’m proud to be part of it.”
The hard-hitting advert, created by the award-winning creative agency ais London and edited by the multiaward winning Sam Sneade, premiered during the Britain’s Got Talent live finals on Saturday. It also features TV personality Arlene Phillips and Dame Joan Bakewell.
Phillips, carer to her father who has Alzheimer’s disease, said: “The Alzheimer’s Research UK advert brings home the urgent need for more investment in dementia research and I hope it will launch something of a fightback against the condition.
“Dementia is not something we have to accept, it’s brought on by diseases that our scientists can beat if we all get behind them. We shouldn’t have to just cope with dementia, we should be able to defeat it.”
Tim Parry, head of communications at Alzheimer’s Research UK, said: “Alzheimer’s Research UK’s core aim is to defeat Alzheimer’s and other forms of dementia and we believe that with continued funding and world class research, we will make a breakthrough.
“To give us the best chance of beating the condition sooner, we wanted this advert to have a disruptive approach in educating the public, to challenge people’s perception that nothing can be done to tackle diseases like Alzheimer’s, and to demonstrate that research has already gone a long way in taming other serious diseases and can do the same for dementia.”