Introduction
On 29 June 2006, during the 16th Alzheimer Europe Annual Conference, Alzheimer Europe and its member organisations adopted the Paris Declaration, which called for European and national policy makers to give Alzheimer's disease and other forms of dementia the political priority it deserves.
The Declaration marked 100 years since Alois Alzheimer first described the symptoms of the disease that was to bear his name and identified four key areas for action on dementia:
- Public health priorities
- Research and medical priorities
- Care and social support priorities
- Legal and ethical priorities.
The Paris Declaration - Executive Summary
Alzheimer Europe and its member organisations called upon the European Union, the World Health Organization (WHO), the Council of Europe and national governments to:
- Recognise Alzheimer's disease as a major public health challenge and to develop European, International and national action programmes,
- Dedicate a European Parliament report and resolution on the state of dementia care, treatment and research in Europe,
- Recognise Alzheimer's disease as a major health scourge within the meaning of Article 152 of the EC Treaty and to develop a Community action programme on Alzheimer's disease,
- Investigate the possibility of providing core finding to Alzheimer Europe for the exchange of information and best practices between national Alzheimer associations.
- Make dementia a compulsory part of medical training,
- Support awareness campaigns targeted at the general public to improve the recognition of the symptoms of Alzheimer's disease,
- Continue to make available existing treatments under their national reimbursement systems,
- Support a survey on the existing inequalities of access to available treatments for Alzheimer's disease,
- Foster pan-European research into the causes, prevention and treatment of Alzheimer's disease and other dementias,
- Increase the funding for Alzheimer's research and support collaboration of national research centres,
- Promote the role of Alzheimer associations towards the medical profession so that people diagnosed are systematically informed about Alzheimer associations and the services they provide,
- Recognise the important contributions provided by Alzheimer associations and to provide financial support to them,
- Recognise the significant burden of carers of people with dementia and to support the development of adequate respite services,
- Develop and support a whole range of services for people with dementia ,
- Adequately support people with dementia and their carers to allow them to make use of existing services,
- Extend the Open Method of Coordination to the question of long-term care and to exchange best practices on a national level,
- Reinforce medical codes to ensure people with dementia are adequately informed about their diagnosis,
- Exchange ebst practices with regard to national guardianship systems,
- Provide a clear statutory basis for effective advance directives with appropriate safeguards
The full text of the Paris Declaration is available to download below in English, Czech, French and German.