THE Department of Health has no strategy for dealing with dementia in Northern Ireland – three years after the Executive made a commitment to put the crucial policy in place.

Dementia currently costs the public purse £400 million a year and millions more in private care costs. There are currently around 18,000 sufferers in Northern Ireland and that figure is predicted to treble over the next 40 years.

It is the most pressing of health issues, but the plan for dealing with it has been shelved and won’t be picked up again until after the election – where it’s not even a topic of discussion.

The Executive and Assembly have to agree how the burden will be carved up; the extent to which public finances can pay for care and when sufferers and their families will have to step in.

The Detail understands that the blueprint on the way forward has been sitting on a shelf at the Department of Health since September 2010 and campaigners want to know why it is not being acted on.

Deirdre Blakely, director of the NI branch of the Alzheimer’s Society, said: “Our message is simple, dementia is the most serious illness that older people and more and more younger people, are facing in Northern Ireland. It’s the biggest issue facing our society right now, in the same way cancer was 10 or 15 years ago."

Full article