Carers ⊓ the uk⊙s unsung heroes ⊓ what can we give back?

The UK’s 7m unpaid carers are amongst the most giving people we know.

They are all around us, caring for mums, husbands, daughters, sons, brothers, grans, friends….the list is endless, and they do this free of charge and unconditionally because they have an emotional connection with the person they care for.

Anyone can be a carer, a 7 year old boy helping his mum with her cancer treatments, a 90 year old woman supporting her husband with dementia, a 30 year old dad caring for his daughter born with cerebral palsy or a 60 year old woman caring for her dad who is old and frail.

3 in 5 of us will be a carer at some point, carers are all around us, propping up our health and social care systems, preventing winter deaths, keeping people out of our stretched A&E departments, providing a wide array of nursing and personal care tasks and ensuring people with care needs don’t become lonely and isolated.

Along with caring, unpaid carers have their own lives to lead at school, at work, with family and in the community, but they just keep on giving, sometimes at great personal cost to their own health and wellbeing. In fact the economic value of their gift is estimated at around £135bn every year, and its growing as our demography changes and we all live longer.

So, we should all ask ourselves, what can we give back to carers?

This blog was produced by @LuenThompson, who is the Director or Marketing and Communications at the @CarersTrust.


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