DEMENTIA IN SOCIETY
Alzheimer associations are working hard to support those affected by the war in Ukraine Our Chairperson Iva Holmerová, who is also founder of the Czech Alzheimer Society, Martina Mátlová, Director of the Czech Alzheimer Society, and Zbigniew Tomczak, Chairperson of the Polish Alzheimer’s Association, share their thoughts on the ongoing invasion of Ukraine and what is being done by their countries and their associations to support people affected and displaced by the conflict, particularly those affected by dementia.
Iva Holmerová, Chairperson, Alzheimer Europe
We have been watching the war live for many days. A war in Europe that threatens to be the biggest since the Second World War, threatening not only the entire continent but also the civilised world. A peaceful European country has been invaded by an aggressor. By an aggressor that has never given up its expansionist tendencies for many decades and which, systematically and unfortunately largely undetected, has been building up its intelligence networks in all European countries and across the Atlantic, significantly influencing major political events, elections and otherwise doing all sorts of damage in order to consolidate its power and connect its malicious networks.
How damaging this is was perhaps not something we wanted to believe until the first invasion of Ukraine in 2014, the murders on UK soil or the attack on ammunition depots in my country (Czech Republic). This undoubted international influence, together with a sense of unlimited power in their own realm, but also complete isolation from ordinary people in democratic nations, undoubtedly accentuated by fear during a pandemic, has led a psychopathic individual, gradually consolidating his power and dreaming of unlimited world domination, to make the insane decision to launch this unprecedented aggression. I live in a country that experienced aggression in 1968, when the Soviet occupation isolated us from the countries of democratic Europe for the next decades. Even when Russian tanks were shuffling along our borders, we also did not believe that occupation was possible. It happened, and afterwards we lived in an environment of fear, oppression of freedoms and opinions, restriction of all activities, not only political ones, but also cultural and simple civic ones. The totalitarian power supervised everything that was taught in schools, what people could and could not say, and what and who could appear in the media.
Even thirty years after the fall of the Iron Curtain in Europe, these devastating effects of decades of totalitarian rule are still evident throughout the former Soviet bloc. I am always aware of this when I present the new version of the European Dementia Monitor (see: https://www.alzheimer-europe. org/reports-publication/2020-alzheimereurope-report-european-dementia-monitor2020-comparing-and). The Central and Eastern countries have integrated into Europe in many respects, especially politically and economically, but there are areas where traces of the division of Europe are still evident. These include, among others, the success of scientists and their participation in European collaborative research, and also the care of people living with dementia. The traces of the Iron Curtain are still evident in the provision of care for people with dementia, but that is no cause for regret. On the contrary: I would like to thank our member organisations in these countries for doing everything they can to improve the care of people with dementia and the quality of life of people living with dementia and their families.
Dementia in Europe
27
