Action call over dementia sufferers’ death toll
Support charities are calling for action over the death toll that the coronavirus pandemic has caused among people with dementia.
Charities. including the Alzheimer’s Society, say 1,700 people with dementia in the North East are estimated to have died from the virus since the pandemic hit the UK in March last year.
They are among more than 34,000 with the condition to have died in England and Wales from Covid-19 - making people with dementia the group worst hit.
A coalition of dementia organisations have joined together in a call to make sure those affected with dementia and their families do not face such hardship and loss in the future.
An Alzheimer’s Society’s investigation claims the pandemic’s toll goes even further.
A survey of 1,001 people who care for a family member, partner or someone close to them with dementia, found that 92% said covid had accelerated their loved one’s dementia symptoms – with 28% of family carers saying they’d seen an “unmanageable decline” in their health during the pandemic.
Danielle Cooper, area manager for Alzheimer’s Society in the North East, said: “Coronavirus has shattered the lives of so many people with dementia, who have been worst hit by the pandemic - lives taken by the virus itself, and many more prematurely taken due to increased dementia symptoms.
“Family carers, too, have been buckling under the strain. We urge the Government to support people affected by dementia, whose lives have been upended, to put recovery plans in place, and make the legacy of covid a social care system that cares for the most vulnerable.”