Dementia Support Line
New Age UK ‘The Health and Care of Older People in England 2019’ report on social care – Alzheimer’s Society comment
A new report from Age UK has found that social care is in desperate need of a long term plan for social care funding.
In the meantime, Wednesday’s Spending Review must direct very substantial additional investment into care services in 2020/2021 to avert the risk of complete collapse in the worst affected districts.
The report, ‘The Health and Care of Older People in England 2019’, draws on many official statistics as well as new Age UK analysis to provide a comprehensive picture of how services are functioning today for older people across the NHS and social care.
Sally Copley, Director of Policy and Campaigns at Alzheimer’s Society, said:
'Yet another strong report clearly evidences that the social care system is heading for collapse. The social care crisis is a dementia crisis, with three-fifths of people receiving homecare and 70% of people in care homes having dementia.
'Millions of pounds are being drained from the NHS because of avoidable hospital admissions and people being stuck in hospital even when they’re well enough to leave, because they don’t have access to the care and support they need in the community.'
'We must have a dedicated £2.4bn NHS Dementia Fund in Wednesday’s Spending Review to address the most pressing issues for people with dementia while longer term solutions are agreed and implemented. Decisive action from the Prime Minister is needed with more funding for dementia care, or we risk the complete collapse of services and people with dementia let down by the catastrophic state of care.'
