Press Release

END “UNBEARABLE SUFFERING” URGES TUTU

3rd July 2006

Archbishop backs World Hospice and Palliative Care Day 2006

Archbishop Desmond Tutu, patron of the Palliative Care Association in South Africa, has given his support to World Hospice and Palliative Care Day 2006 – a day of action which is being marked in more than 70 countries around the globe on 7th October.

Commenting on the Day, the Archbishop said, “The prospect of facing a terminal illness and all the physical and emotional suffering that it entails is daunting for anyone. No one should have to face that without any support to relieve their symptoms and pain, calm their anxiety and help them and their family to cope with the situation. But that is the exact situation for millions of people around the world who are living with a terminal illness without any access to hospice and palliative care. There are many countries in the world where hospice and palliative care services barely even exist at all. I urge individuals and governments to take action to change this situation and stop this unbearable suffering.”

The theme of this year’s World Day is ‘Access to care for all’, highlighting the many and diverse barriers that prevent millions of people all over the world who are affected by terminal illness from accessing the care they need. In resource poor countries, there is frequently little or no hospice and palliative care provision. Although Sub-Saharan Africa has twice as many deaths per 1000 head of population annually as North America, it has only 1.5% of global palliative care resources compared to 55% in North America. Last year 2.5 million people in Africa died from AIDS without access to hospice and palliative care services, half a million of them children. In India only 1% of the population has access to any kind of hospice and palliative care services.

Even in developed countries there is frequently inequity of access with regional variation in provision and people with particular illnesses being more or less likely to access care. In the UK, insufficient NHS funding for hospice and palliative care services means that many people especially with illnesses other than cancer do not access the care they need. 32% of hospices in England receive less than one quarter of their funding from the government, requiring them to source over three quarters of their running costs from charitable fundraising.

Nick Pahl, Development Director, Help the Hospices, commented, “The issues that affect access to hospice and palliative care vary from country to country but the underlying reasons are the same – namely that governments don’t treat it as a core healthcare service, which of course it is. We want to see the right for people to die a dignified, pain-free death recognised as a human right. The key thing to remember is that hospice and palliative care doesn’t have to be expensive. It can be provided in people’s homes, via outreach services, and with the support of volunteers. In Uganda, it costs the same amount to provide a cancer patient with enough morphine to keep them pain-free for two weeks as it does to buy them a loaf of bread.”

About World Hospice and Palliative Care Day 2006

Thousands of people around the world will be staging events to raise awareness and fundraise for hospice and palliative care services locally, nationally and internationally to mark this annual global event.

Activities this year will include events around the themes of walking and poetry. Many different types of events are anticipated, including exhibitions, competitions, rallies, conferences and street parties. An anthology of poems by people affected by terminal illness from around the world will be launched on the 6th October 2006 at the Tate Modern, London, UK. Poetry workshops are taking place in hospices throughout the country led by leading UK poets Wendy Cope, Adrian Mitchell, Alice Oswald, Roger Robinson, Francesca Beard and Jackie Kay. In the UK the day will also be marked by the publication of an in-depth report about access to hospice and palliative care services.

The first ever World Hospice and Palliative Care Day took place in October 2005 with more than 1100 events taking place in 74 countries. It was launched by HRH The Princess Royal, Princess Anne, in London.

To find out more and get involved in World Hospice and Palliative Care Day 2006, visit www.worldday.org, or email worldday@helpthehospices.org.uk.

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